Arcane Legacy: The Anime Wars
by Lilhexa
Summary: So basically it's another so-called hero fanfic where the world suddenly gets sucked into a good vs. evil battle. Although in this case the "evil" is not quite that apparent. Each Character is based on a real person whom I've decided deserves a chapter.
1. Ch 6 Pt 1: Where the Blood Roses Grow

**Anime Wars: Where the Blood Rose Grows**

"I'm really no good with _children_."

"We really need you for this one though."

"I'm not sure I'm exactly qualified for this assignment."

"I thought you'd say that. My counter, triple your usual."

"There are some things in life that are more important than money," Jacky said with an intimidating grin. "Nothing I can think of though."

"Please reconsider, this is really something only you can do."

Jacky brushed the hair out of his face. He stared at the director's eyes. The light hazel irises were surprisingly soft for someone with Jacky's appearance.

"Make it five times my normal and I might reconsider." He picked up his bag and swung it over his shoulder. The sound of rustling papers could be heard.

The director shivered. "He's really scary when he smiles like that," he thought to himself. "We will definitely take you up on that offer."

Jacky stopped in front of the doorway to straighten out his tie. The recently pressed dress coat seemed out of place in such a bleak room. He pushed down his hair and turned around. "Send the details to my cell, and I'll know where to go from there." He walked out the door and headed down a narrow hallway. The door at the end automatically swished open, and after walking down two flights of stairs, Jacky was in the parking lot of a tall skyscraper. "What a nuisance."

Suddenly Jacky felt something vibrate in his pocket. He reached in and pulled out a long, slim phone. He slowly walked up to a small red car and got into the drivers seat. Jacky stared at his phone. "If I don't check it until later, I can have a few hours to myself," he thought.

The phone slide up, revealing a number pad. The narrow LCD screen shined brightly. "Let's see what I have to do…"

He pressed a few buttons, and opened up the e-mail that was supposed to brief him on his assignment.

Jacky let out a big sigh. "The target is a woman…" he said in a somber tone. He threw his phone into the passenger seat. His back slid down the leather seat as he stared out the window. "What have I gotten myself into…" Jacky sat up and started his car and turned on the radio. His body seemed to freeze. Slowly, he reached for his phone.

"Am I sinister enough to raise a gun to… a mother?" The car backed out of the parking lot and turned left onto the road. "We'll see how this plays out…"

"Kyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa it's Itou-kunnnnnnnn." A swarm of girls surrounded the school entrance, all pushing and shoving to get the attention of the approaching guy. He walked in smiling and waving at everyone and disappeared behind the doors.

"Ahh Riki-chan, he didn't even look this way…"

"Geez Ari this is the last time I'm coming along with you when you're in fan-girl mode…"

"Riki, don't be so mean… I know you like him too. Deep down inside, you want to be a screaming fan-girl too." Ari walked up and took Riki's hand. "Now let's go to homeroom together."

Riki responded by shrugging. He slowly picked up his bag and followed Ari through the school doors.

"Riki look! There's a bunch of people in our homeroom today. I wonder what's up." They walked in together and stood behind a mob of girls deep in discussion.

"Kyaaaa, a new student. We haven't had any new 'contestants' for a while," said a tall girl.

"Saya-sama, you make it sound like there's some kind of competition going on," the other girls replied.

"Poor naïve girls, all upperclassmen are automatically locked in battle to become The Top Guy. It's just the competitive nature of males. They want to have the best car, the best girl, and the most popularity. All so they can show it off.  
"Our job as the girls of this school is to help feed their hunger for superiority. It's as simple as that…"

Riki and Ari slowly joined the group and listened.

"We'll see how well this newbie plays the game," Saya said with a smirk. "Moko, did you take his student files?'

"Y-yes," Moko said timidly.

"Well tell us a little about him…"

"Uhmm, well his name is Hu, Jacky. He's 182.9cm and 63.5kg, his birthday is February 16th, 1991. And that's all his file says about him."

"What?!" Saya grabbed the file from Moko. "It doesn't say anything about his pervious schools or his grades. How peculiar."

The bell rang and the mob of girls dispersed. The students slowly took their seats.

"Ari, let's sit in the front," said Riki.

"Good morning Kurunoma Sensei." A woman wearing a dark purple blouse and black skirt walked to the front of the class.

"Hoho, Kurunoma Sensei is wearing that skirt again," one of the students whispered to his friend.

Her slender legs drew the attention of everyone in the class.

"Gah, even I wouldn't have the confidence to dress like that," Ari whispered to Riki.

"She's trying way too hard Ari. You're fine just the way you are." Riki slowly turned around and faced the new student. "Hi, I'm Riki. If you have any questions you can come to me."

Jacky looked up and saw Riki's face. Riki had a delicate smile and glowing eyes. "Thank you for offer. I will come to you if I need any help." Jacky shot back a smile equally as radiant. "But I think I pretty much have everything under control now."

"What's with this guy, he seems so cold," Riki thought. Riki turned back around and listened to the morning announcements.

"Don't forget to attend today's basketball game. It's the Wednesday faculty face off, where the teachers play against the boys' basketball team. Show up and watch the team get beaten by Kurunoma Sensei!"

The speakers went quiet, and Kurunoma Sensei stood up. "Alright class, as you noticed already, we have a new student joining us today." She walked up to Jacky's desk and pulled him to the front of the class. "Please introduce yourself."

"Good morning everyone. My name is Hu, Jacky and I just moved here from Hong Kong." Jacky stood up tall and smiled, then headed back to his seat.

"Is that all you're going to tell us?" Kurunoma Sensei asked. She looked at Jacky with disappointed eyes.

"Nobody really needs to know anything more about me," Jacky replied, giving Kurunoma a cold glare.

Kurunoma froze. "His eyes, are the same as my own…" She felt her body grow heavy. "The stare that has… death written all over it."

The class continued to chat without paying much attention.

"What a troublesome kid," Kurunoma thought. "Going that far to receive attention." She retaliated with a wide smile. "Ok, I wont force you to tell us anymore."

"Hu-san, do you mind showing me your schedule?" asked Riki.

"Sure thing," Jacky said cheerfully. He pulled out a piece of paper and handed it to Riki.

"Whoa, you have all the same classes as Ari."

"Really?" said Ari. "That makes it easier for you I guess. I can show you how to get everywhere."

Jacky smiled and took Ari's hand. "Please take care of me." He stood up and headed for the door.

"Jacky, the three of us have Literature Studies together 2nd period. I'll see you then." Riki said, as he ran ahead of Jacky.

"He's usually not this energetic," Ari said to Jacky. "I guess he's just excited that you're here."

"I see, well I don't see why he would like me."

"Don't say that," Ari said with a smile. "You're good looking, tall, and well built. You will have no problem making friends."

"Aren't you worried about Riki though?" Jacky said in an eerie tone.

"W-why are you asking that so suddenly?" Ari looked up and Jacky with a puzzled face.

"Well I'm just wondering, how everyone will react when they find out that he's gay." Jacky didn't even face her when he said this. He just kept walking and looking down on the floor. Ari felt like he was stomping down on her with every step he took.

"H-how did you find out?" Ari asked. She rushed in front of Jacky and looked at him with serious eyes.

Jacky grinned and pushed Ari aside. He kept walking without looking back once.

"This is bad, Riki is not ready for people to know yet…" Ari clenched her fist and dashed at full speed. "How much will it take for you to keep quiet."

Jacky didn't show any reaction and continued to ignore her.

"Please…"

Jacky continued to strut away.

Ari finally stopped pursuing him. She stood still with her head hung low.

"I'm not the kind of guy who would spread other people's personal information," Jacky said, suddenly popping up behind Ari. He put his hand on her shoulder and gave her a look of reassurance. "C'mon, we'll be late for class."

"Sorry we're late Sensei, I got lost on the other side of school and Ari-san helped me get here." Jacky gave a polite bow and headed towards one of the empty desks.

"It's ok, I wont hold it against you during your first week at school, but don't make it a habit." The teacher walked up to the board and began her lesson.

At the end of class, the students stood up and left. Jacky waited at the door for Ari and they headed out together.

"This way," she pointed. Jacky followed behind, not saying a word the whole way. They arrived in the classroom to find Riki in the back with two desks saved.

Ari gave a big smile. "Are these for us?"

"Pshh no they're for my two friends…"

Jacky ignored him and took a seat in the front row next to a girl reading a book.

"Hey Hu-san, I was kidding. This seat is yours." Riki yelled. The whole class turned around to see what all the commotion was.

Jacky turned around to see Riki and Ari waving at him. "I guess I have no choice," Jacky thought. He thought back to the instructions on his assignment.

Blend in with the class and do not draw any unnecessary

attention. Your top priority is watching for any suspicious

activity around Tatina Kurunoma. You have until the end

of the term to get rid of her, which is approximately three

weeks. After three weeks, you will be leaving the school.

"Such poorly written instructions," Jacky thought while staring out the window. "How am I supposed to follow along when the statements are so vague?"

"Pssst Jacky, whatcha lookin' at?" Riki said, poking his shoulder.

Jacky snapped out of his thought. "It's nothing important." Jacky remembered the most important part of the e-mail.

"When you're in school, you're just a normal teenager. Don't be yourself, and use this time to live the teenage life you never had."

"What is the life of a teenager like…" Jacky thought.

"Hey, what's wrong Jacky? You don't look so well," said Riki.

"Oh, it's nothing. I've just been having headaches ever since last week."

Riki reached out his hand and felt Jacky's forehead. "Hmm it does feel a bit warm." He felt it again, "Want me to take you to the nurse?"

"No I'm fine…"

"Jacky, don't push yourself on the first day, go," said Ari.

"I guess so," said Jacky. Riki stood up and grabbed Jacky by the shoulder.

"Sensei, I'm going to take Jacky to the nurse ok?"

They walked out of the classroom. "Thanks for helping me Riki."

"No problem, I told you, if you ever need help, come to me." He smiled and directed Jacky through a series of hallways.

"So this is what it feels like to have friends," Jacky thought. "People who aren't your lover or your family, that care about you…"

They walked into a large room and were greeted by a woman wearing a white blouse and skirt. "What's the problem?"

"My friend here is feeling unwell, I think he has a slight fever."

Jacky stood up tall and looked down at the nurse. Rather than focusing on the nurse, he glanced around the room.

"He says he's had a bunch of headaches lately."

The nurse reached her hand out and felt Jacky's forehead. "He doesn't have a fever… I think you're just overworked son…"

Jacky thought back to what he's done in the past month. "8 quick assignments traveling all over the globe," he thought to himself.

"I think you just need some rest, you can sleep here for a while."

"Oh, I don't want to burden you," Jacky replied.

"Don't worry dear, it's my job," the nurse said with a smile.

"Ok I'll come and see how you're doing later ok, bye Jacky." Riki dashed out of the room and disappeared behind the door.

"Don't worry," the nurse said. "You can rest here, it's no problem."

Jacky walked over to one of the beds and rested his head on the clean white pillow. "This is… surprisingly comfortable," he thought. Slowly he closed his eyes and thought of his plans. "I have to… watch Kurunoma… and… kill her."

"Jacky, wake up. Jacky! Hellooooo." Ari walked up to the sleeping Jacky and shook him lightly. "Jacky, it's the end of the day…"

"Let me try Ari. Jacky, wake up. You've slept through the whole day."

The voices finally reached him. Jacky bolted up and looked around. "Where am I," he thought.

"Oh yay, you're awake!" said Ari. "You slept through all of your classes."

"I came by to see how you were doing, but you were fast asleep and snoring," said Riki. "I didn't want to wake you up."

"I wonder when was the last time I slept so well," Jacky thought.

"Anyways, we'll see you tomorrow ok?" Riki and Ari both waved. "Bye!"

Jacky turned on his phone and checked his voice messages.

"Hmm, 10 missed calls from Director…" Jacky stood up and left the nurse's office. "How annoying," he thought.

He brought the phone up to his ear, and listened to 10 messages of Director Tsunda asking for the progress on his assignment.

"Hello, Director?"

"Jacky, how are things going?"

"No progress so far…"

"Well we weren't expecting results after the first day. Speaking of first days, how was your first day of school?"

"Don't worry, I can get this done…"

"We are not doubting your skills. However, we would like to give you some assistance. How do you feel about having a partner?"

There was a long pause.

"Director, you know that I'm solitary. A partner would just hold me back, or get in my way."

"We thought you'd say that. But we have already decided to give you a partner on this assignment. She may be of some help, or not…"

"A female partner… is this some kind of test to see if I can succeed even while being distracted?"

"I'll explain more to you later ok Jacky." The Director hung up.

"I hate partners…" Jacky said. He headed towards the student parking lot to his car. "This… might be fun."

"Good morning Riki." Ari was leaning against her locker.

"Good morning Ari." Riki waved and looked around. "You see Jacky anywhere?"

"No, I haven't…" "You think he'll show up today?"

"I dunno, he looked pretty sick yesterday."

Moko suddenly came running down the hallway. "Saya-sama!!!! I have the files you asked for."

"What… again?"

"Let's go see what this is about…" Riki grabbed Ari and they ran after Moko.

"Saya-sama! I have the files!!" Moko finally stopped in Kurunoma's homeroom again.

"Thank you Moko, now hand them over."

"What's this all about," one of the girls asked.

"Well, we apparently have another new student," said Saya. "It's a girl this time, apparently her name is Ai Minako. She's 168cm and 46kg."

"WHAT?!!"

"That's the name of Sailor Venus," one of the girls yelled out.

"How dumb, she must be like obsessed with anime or something," said another girl.

"Now now girls, we can't judge someone before we meet them," Saya said with a smirk. "We won't be able to truly make fun of her until we see how much of a loser she is." All the girls started laughing hysterically.

"What's so funny," said a girl, as she was walking into the room. She had long chestnut colored hair.

"Excuse me, are you part of this conversation," one of the girls yelled out.

"Oh sorry, I didn't mean to butt in." The girl took a seat in the front.

"Who is that girl anyways?" asked Saya.

"Probably just some nameless loser."

"Anyways, to be courteous, we won't make fun of the new girl, until we meet her," said Saya.

Riki and Ari walked into homeroom. "Hmm, Hu-san isn't in homeroom yet," said Riki. "Maybe we should look for him elsewhere?"

"No, if he's coming to school today, he'll definitely show up in homeroom."

Kurunoma walked in and said hello to the class. "The bell is going to ring in 6 minutes, everyone should be heading to their seats soon."

The girl with chestnut hair approached Kurunoma. "Uhmm, I'm Ai Minako, the new student. I just thought I'd let you know that I'm doing fine so far."

"OH right! They told me I was getting another new student yesterday. I'm happy you could join us this semester. If you have any questions, you can basically ask any student in the school."

"Ok Sensei, thank you."

Riki and Ari sat down. They stared at the clock. "Two minutes until the beginning of homeroom."

"Good morning Hu-san," said one of Saya's minions. The whole group dispersed and formed around Jacky.

"Kyaaa he's so cute," one of them screamed.

"Hu-san, how are you?"

"Will you go out with me please?"

Jacky felt someone pull his shirt sleeve. He looked to his right and found Ari and Riki tugging him out of the mob.

"Good morning Hu-san," said Ari and Riki. "We thought you might not show up today." They took their seats and continued talking.

"We're glad you came," said Ari.

The bell rang and homeroom began. Kurunoma stood up and went to the front of the class.

"Hello class, today we have another new student, come introduce yourself,"

Minako stood up and pranced to the front of the class. "Hello, my name is Ai Minako, and I'm like totally excited to be here with you guys! I like eating pancakes and waffles and drinking orange juice." Minako smiled and then took her seat.

"Ok well now that we're finished with that, let's just sit tight and wait for the announcements," said Kurunoma.

When the bell rang again, everyone left to their first period class.

"Ari, Riki, I have to go to my locker. Go on without me ok?" said Jacky.

"Sure…"

Jacky walked down to his locker and entered in his combination.

"Are you even trying to complete your assignment," said a voice from behind him,

Jacky turned around and saw nobody.

"Hehehe fooled ya."

Jacky turned back around and found Minako standing in front of his locker.

"They sent you to be my partner?"

"Yep, we're gonna have TONS of fun!" Minako reached out her arms and hugged Jacky. "We're gonna become best friends. I just know it."

Jacky turned around and continued to open up his locker.

"You're mean…" Minako groaned.

"I have one rule," said Jacky. "And that's don't get in my way…" He pulled out three books from his locker then shut the door. "If you follow that rule, we'll have no problems."

Jacky turned around and strutted away.

"Stop right there mister," said Minako. Suddenly she dashed up and grabbed him by the throat. Her expression turned deadly. "Don't expect me to be some minion that follows your every order and worships you…" She dug her nails into the sides of his throat. "If I don't agree with you, I'll do what I feel is best, so don't expect to be callin' all the shots here."

She released her grasp on Jacky's throat. "Impressive… you didn't even flinch, and managed to keep a straight face the whole time," Minako said. "Maybe this wont be a worthless partnership after all."

"Well don't expect me to give a damn about anything you say, you got that?" Jacky pushed Minako aside and headed down the hallway. "We should be getting to class…" said Jacky. "We don't want to draw any attention remember."

Jacky walked into class 12 minutes late.

"Sorry, I forgot how to open my locker." He bowed and then took his seat next to Ari.

"I knew I should've went with you…" said Ari.

When the class ended, Jacky walked out to find Minako waiting for him. "Hey, come with me." Minako grabbed Jacky's arm and pulled him through many hallways. "I need to talk to you," she said, as they were running.

They finally stopped in front of a large red door. "Make this quick, we have class now…" said Jacky. He looked at Minako impatiently. "Well??"

"Oh shut up Jacky. Lucky for you, I found out where Kurunoma lives," she said with a smile. "We can finally move forward in this operation."

"Good job Minako. But I could've done that myself. I didn't want to rush this assignment…"

"Yeah yeah yeah…"

"Ok now let's get back to class," said Jacky.

"Wait… shouldn't we at least start thinking of a plan?" Minako sat down on the floor and pulled a pen and notepad from her bag.

"Leave that to me… you don't need to worry about anything. You just have to stay out of the way."

"So you just plan out jumping out and shooting her?" Minako gave him a playful smile. "That's so typical cowardly villain…"

Jacky walked in front of Minako and stared down at her. "I'm not a villain," he said in a cold tone. "You can say, I'm the bad guy for the good guys…"

"Yeah, you can cut the whole anti-assassin crap. A hired assassin is a hired assassin, no matter how you look at it."

"I only kill bad guys, while people like Kurunoma kill anyone as long as they're paid decently."

"Whatever… but in the end, you're still a killer." Minako smiled and stood up. "Weren't you going to head to class?"

Jacky looked at his watch. "Crap… you made me 45 minutes late for class…" He turned around and ran down the hallways. "Dammit… by the time I get there, class will be almost over."

Finally he walked into the room, hoping he'd be unnoticed.

"Thanks for showing up Hu-san…" said the Teacher. "You too Minako…"

"I'm sorry sensei, we were talking and we lost track of time…" Jacky bowed and walked over to an empty table.

"Well it was better than being in this stupid class," said Minako. "I'm glad we missed most of it."

Minako took the seat next to Jacky. She took out a piece of paper and a pen and looked up. "So are you going to continue your lesson or what?"

The teacher's face turned red with anger. "We were actually doing an experiment, which you two can do after school during detention."

"What a waste of time," said Minako.

"Yes sensei, we'll be there." Jacky looked over at Minako and glared at her with his heavy eyes. His expression seemed to read "Shut up or you'll be dead before you know it."

"Sorry Sensei, we'll be there," Minako said.

"Minako, you better be coming with me to detention," said Jacky. "You're doing a pretty poor job not standing out and drawing attention instead. If we fail it'll be because of you."

"Fine whatever, I promise I'll behave from now on." Minako tied up her hair and grabbed Jacky's hand. "Let's go…"

Jacky and Minako walked in to find sensei waiting for them with the lab materials.

"In this lab, you'll be figuring out the relationship between how much of the sample you put in, and the reaction time. Please work diligently," said the teacher.

Jacky slipped on his goggles and gloves and got the two containers ready. "We should start off small and work our way up."

"I don't get why you're taking this so seriously," said Minako. "In three weeks, we'll be gone, and we probably won't ever be back."

"This is my first time being in high school, and I don't want to screw it up."

"Well you didn't miss much in high school. It was pretty boring…"

"I wanna see for myself."

"Well I'll speed this up for you." Minako grabbed a handful of the sample and tossed it into the acid. "Was that small enough?"

Jacky ignored her and observed the reaction. "God, I can't see anything through these dirty goggles," said Jacky. He pulled them off his head and continued to observe the acid.

"What a dumb experiment," said Minako. "Nothing seems to be happening."

Suddenly there was a huge bubble, and the acid flew everywhere.

"Crap, I think I got it in my left eye… it stings a lot." Jacky ran to the sink to wash his eye.

"What are you talking about," said Minako. "The acid didn't even pop up that high, no way it could've have gotten in your eye."

"Well something did, it hurts a lot," said Jacky. He slowly walked up to Minako. "Can you check to see if anything is in there?" Jacky opened his left eye.

Minako turned around and fell out of her chair. "Your whole eye is red…" She stood up and took another look. "What the hell is this, it's red…"

"Well of course it's red, it's bloodshot from being irritated," Jacky tried to look around for a mirror.  
"Dude, I'm talking about your iris. Your whole friggin iris is red." Minako pulled a small mirror from her pocket. "Take a look."

Jacky grabbed the mirror and took a look. "What the hell…" Minako was right, his whole iris was crimson red, with a pink squiggle horizontally across the center.

"Jacky…," Minako said in a quiet voice. "I remember what it is."

"You mean you've seen this before?" asked Jacky.

"Yes I have… well not really, but… yeah I have." Minako took another look at his eye. "It's called Geass, as in a power from the anime _Code Geass_…"

"What are you talking about?"

"Geass is a power that varies from person to person. It usually has something to do with the mind and perception and what not… like the main character Lelouch, he could do mind control, and his dad Charles could like erase people's memories, and implant memories into people it was pretty sick, and this other guy Rolo… oh my god he was adorable. He could freeze people…"

"Minako, could you stop talking for just a moment. I don't want to hear your voice… I'm trying to make sense of what's happening right now."

"Speak up I can't--" Minako froze, "What the hell, I can't talk…" Minako screamed.

"Why are you screaming?" Jacky said, with an annoyed look on his face.

Minako suddenly turned around and threw the glass beaker onto the ground. It shattered into many pieces.

"What the hell, I couldn't hear that. I can't hear myself talk!" Minako yelled out. "I think it's because of your geass."

"My… geass?" Jacky said hesitantly. "Why can you still hear my voice then?"

"I dunno, all geass had different rules. Lelouch couldn't control someone more than once, and Rolo had a time limit to his freezing ability," Minako yelled.

"First of all, stop yelling. Secondly, what good is this power if someone can still hear me…"

"I guess you got unlucky when it came to receiving geass."

"I don't see how this is happening," said Jacky. "Do you have any idea how this is happening?"

"What the hell!" yelled Minako. "Now I can't see either…"

"Minako, you must be playing some kind of joke on me. It's not funny."

"B-but, I can… still see you. But only you. Everything else is dark."

"Minako… you seriously can stop acting now. I already saw through your little joke. Now let's get back to work."

"Do I look like I'm fucking joking here?" "Wait… hearing, sight. You seem to be able to remove people's senses."

"Ok, I'm gonna leave now Minako. I have to figure out what's wrong with my eye."

"No, I'm not joking you've got to believe me."

"Fine fine I'll play along, just because I'm bored." Jacky stood up and walked over to Minako. "Ok I'm gonna take away your sense of touch now," Jacky said with a grin. "Don't feel anything…"

Jacky raised his hand and slapped Minako right across the face. "Did you feel that."

A stream of tears fell from Minako's eyes. "Noo," Minako whispered. "I can't feel my limbs, or my face. I don't even feel my lips moving, I don't even know if I'm talking." Minako screamed. "Make it stop please…" Minako raised her arm and flailed it around. "I don't even know if I'm moving," Minako said with teary eyes.

"Interesting…" Jacky reached out and grabbed Minako's hand. He pinched her arm until it started bleeding. "Did you feel that?"

"Feel what?"

"This might be useful after all," Jacky said with a wide grin.

"Try closing your eyes for a long time," Minako struggled to say.

"What will that do to my geass?"

"It should make it stop… please, make it stop. I beg you."

Jacky closed his eyes and waited. Suddenly he felt a slap right across his face.

"Don't you ever do that to me again. Or I will kill you."

The sound of footsteps approaching the door grew louder and louder. The door flew open, and the teacher stepped in.

"You guys broke a beaker… you know that you will have to pay to replace it."

Jacky placed his hand over his left eye and pretended to write something down on a piece of paper. "We're sorry Sensei, it won't happen again."

"How far have you gotten in the lab?" The teacher walked up and picked up Jacky's paper. "You guys have done nothing! I'm surprised. You guys might want to clean up your act if you intend to stay in this school, you understand?"

"Yes Sensei, we're sorry." Jacky bent over and began to pick up the glass. "Who does he think he is, talking to me like that," Jacky thought. "Do teachers really have this much authority?"

"Look, mister, we'll get the lab done in the next 15 minutes don't worry," Minako said. "We're not as hopeless as we look," she said with a smirk.

"You're acting pretty big for someone who doesn't know what she's talking about," the teacher said with a smile. "I'll be expecting quality work from you guys then." The teacher walked out of the room and closed the door.

Jacky tossed the glass into the trashcan and sat back down at the table. "What was that all about?" He filled the beaker with acid again and began to organize the samples on the table. "We won't be able to finish it time."

"You know what? You need to shut up ok Jacky. I told you… high school is boring, it's all the same." Minako took out a pen from her bag and began to draw a table. Then she took out a calculator and began writing numbers down. "This stuff is easy once you do it once…"

Jacky took the paper from Minako. It had numbers and symbols written all over it with a neat table across the top. "How did you do this?"

"I've taken this class before… how else would I know?" Minako packed up her stuff and started putting the lab equipment away. "You can finally get your first A," she said mockingly.

"You know that I do not respect you anymore than I did when I first met you…" Jacky said coldly. "Just because you know chemistry, don't expect me to suddenly find some sort of value in having you as a partner." Jacky placed the paper onto to teacher's desk. "Now let's go visit Kurunoma…"

"I think that's the first good idea I've heard from you." Minako reached out her hand towards Jacky.

"What are you doing?"

"Lead the way my prince," said Mianko. Jacky took her hand and pulled her through the door into the student parking lot. The sky was darkening, and the winds were picking up. Sand and leaves were blowing all throughout the air.


	2. Ch 6 Pt 2: Where the Blood Roses Grow

The cold leather seats squeaked as they slid into the car. Jacky started the car and drove out of the parking lot. The roads were empty except for the occasional biker.

"The sky is so pretty," Minako said with her head out the window. "It's orange, pink, and purple."

"What's your point?"

"I like it." Minako closed the window and sat back in her chair. She let out a big sigh. "It reminds me of when I used to go fishing with my dad." Minako began playing with the radio. "I hated fishing."

"That's great…" Jacky stopped the car and looked around. "I have no idea how to get to Hospital Street…"

"You know, my real name isn't Ai Minako."

"Interesting… now where am I supposed to turn."

"You want to know my real name?" Minako took Jacky's right hand. "Soo??"

"Look, I don't care if your name is Minako or not… now where is Kurunoma's house?" Jacky glared down at Minako and tensed up when he saw her saddened expression. His face suddenly grew colder. He pulled his hand away from Minako and pushed her back into her seat. "Where is Kurunoma's house???"

"My real name… is Rose, Natsuhi Rose. It's a dumb name isn't it?" Minako opened the unbuckled her seatbelt and opened the door. She walked and looked through the bushes and stared at a nearby neighborhood, then ran back to the car. "Turn left at the next intersection…"

The car began to move again and Minako seemed restless. "My mother's name was Annabelle, she was French Canadian. It's why my hair is this brownish color…" Minako took off her blouse and began playing with the strings on the inside. She seemed to calm down.

Jacky looked over and rolled his eyes. "Can you like sit still and act normal for a moment. It's really distracting."

Minako turned her head and smiled. "You like it… being distracted by me." She pulled her hair back and put on a hat she picked up from Jacky's floor.

"Do you know what I like?" Jacky said coldly. "I like it when people don't get in my way, so I can do my job right." Jacky switched on the turn signal and turned left. Up ahead were two hospitals on both sides of the road, connected by a huge bridge suspended above the street. "When we get to Kurunoma's house, you take one of the guns in the backseat ok. Don't shoot unless it's absolutely necessary."

"What kind of man are you?" Minako teased. "You're too serious, it's sort of attractive." Minako reached her hand and loosened Jacky's tie and unbuttoned the top of his shirt. "I'll help you loosen up."

"Blue house with a large birdbath," Jacky said while pushing Minako down. "I think this is it." He drove passed Kurunoma's house and parked in the drive way two houses ahead. "Get ready."

"Finally, some action." Minako slipped her shirt on and grabbed a vest from the back of Jacky's car. "I call the big gun."

Jacky stepped out of his car and opened the trunk. He took off his shirt and slipped on a thick black knit sweatshirt. "The big gun is back here." Jacky tossed it to Minako. "Have fun with that."

"You know I will." Minako reached up her skirt and tightened the strap securing the nun chuck against her thigh.

"Don't expect me to be protecting you… I'm going to be focusing on killing her."

"Not if I kill her first…" Minako took Jacky's hand and pulled him behind a bush. "I told you, I'm not your minion. So you should treat me better…"

They headed towards Kurunoma's house. Minako tried opening the front door. "It's locked," she said.

"Of course it's locked… who keeps their front door unlocked." Jacky walked around to the back door. There were scratch marks all over the handle. "Minako, the back door is unlocked."

They slowly stepped inside. The house was silent except for the occasional humming of the fridge. "Minako, you check upstairs, I'll check down."

"Got it." Minako dashed up the stairs and into Kurunoma's room. The bed was neatly made, except the closet door was open, with clothes scattered everywhere.

"Oh my god she has 3 shelves filled with Italian shoes…" Minako stepped inside and began going through the land of shoes. "Kyaa lucky me, they're my size." She reached to the top and pulled down a pair of Alexander McQueen heels. "This looks so good on me." Suddenly Minako saw he phone glow green. She responded by pushing end.

"The house is EMPTY," Jacky shouted. He ran up the stairs and into Kurunoma's room. "What are you doing?"

"I'm trying on expensive clothes, duh." Minako's eyes were glowing. "Her closet is amazing."

"Hey, when you become top ranked hitman, you can buy all this crap too. Now look for clues."

Minako still stayed mesmerized by all the shoes.

"Minako, I'll check the closet…"

"Noo that's not fair." Jacky pulled her out and began rummaging through boxes.

Minako trudged towards Kurunoma's bed and began looking through her drawers. She suddenly noticed a flashing red light.

"Yes, LUCKY!" Minako smiled and ran up to Jacky. "She didn't clear her answering machine."

Jacky patted her on the head and walked over to the phone.

Three new messages:

Hello, Q, we set up your place in the usual factory, but

after that, you're on your own. We can't help you anymore

it would draw suspicion to us. Good luck with that…

_Thursday (Today), 2:45 pm _

Hello, Q, do you remember the old factory near the city fountain

where we trained you? Well we might be able to let you use that

to lay low for a while, I can't promise you anything. I hate to

abandon such a wonderful agent, but you know that this

situation has nothing to do with you anymore. I hope you can track

them down before it gets out of hand.

_Wednesday, 10:30pm_

Hello Kurunoma, or should I say Q. Yes it's me, Director Miku

I haven't talked to you in a while. However this call is strictly

business. Or well it's more only your business. No we are no longer

reinstating your place in the council, but we found some interesting

news. The opposing side seemed to have found out about you

rejoining the old group and has sent an anti-assassin after you. He or

she is probably already discovered you and is secretly hidden under

your radar. Please be careful.

_Tuesday, 3:27pm_

"Looks like we're heading into town," said Minako. She picked up her old shoes and put them in her bag. Then she went into the closet and grabbed a box of rings. "I'm a happy girl." Minako laughed and then headed downstairs.

"Minako, we're anti-assassins not thieves, you should put those back." Jacky went down the stairs and walked right by Minako. "It's like a firefighter stealing from houses that were on fire."

"I don't care Jacky. It makes me happy to have this stuff, and now I can focus on the assignment." Minako opened the door and walked into the night, there were bugs flying everywhere.

"Whatever, like I said, don't get in my way." Jacky started the car and backed out of the driveway. "Which way is the city."

"That way," Minako pointed. The car moved out of the neighborhood onto a wide highway. "I haven't been in the city in a while…"

"Don't get distracted ok, we're not going for fun."

"Maybe we should go to a hotel and refresh ourselves before heading in." Minako yawned and grabbed Jacky's right arm. "Please?"

"How many times do I have to push you down before you understand," Jacky said while shaking her loose. "You have to become more mature until you'll ever be able to seduce me…"

"Who said I wanted to sleep with you… I just want to take a shower. I feel disgusting." Minako opened the window and closed her eyes. The air blew her hair everywhere.

Jacky rubbed his eyes and blinked. "I feel tired again," Jacky thought.

"Yay we're in the city, ok now turn right into this hotel," Minako shouted.

Jacky pulled into the parking lot and took a spot near the back. "You get to benefit from me being tired. Otherwise I'd never do this."

Jacky reached for the door handle, when suddenly he felt Minako grab her arm.

"Wait!" she said. "Don't forget to remove your weapons…"

Jacky froze, he turned his body and took all the guns he had off his body. "I can't believe I almost forgot to do that," he thought.

"You really are somethin', I just made a fool out of you, and you don't seem embarrassed at all."

"Everyone makes a mistake every now and then, it's nothing to be ashamed of," he said in a harsh tone.

They got out of the car and headed to the entrance. Minako grabbed Jacky's arm and clung to it tightly.

"Damn, this girl is persistent," Jacky thought. He sighed and walked through the door, dragging Minako with him.

The front desk women looked up.

"Hey look Jan, another high school couple, what do you think?" one of them said.

"Hmm, that girl is practically wearing a sign that says 'I'm a whore, please fuck me' how sad," the other one replied.

"So true, I hope that boy has fun with her…"

"Well he is pretty good looking. The slut sure got lucky this time…"

Minako ran up to the counter and smiled. "A room for two, on the top floor. And with a HUGE bathroom…"

Jacky stepped up behind her and rolled his eyes. He took Minako's arm and pulled her back. "Ahh right, just a normal suite will do…" He grabbed the room key and threw down a 10,000yen bill, pulling Minako with him as he strutted to the elevator.

"What an eager couple," one of the women said while giggling.

"I know, those naïve high school couples always make me laugh."

"Yeah… they always choose the nice hotels to fuck in."

The elevator door swished open and they stepped in. Minako looked up at Jacky and smiled as she hugged his arm tightly. "Thanks, you're not so bad after all…"

He ignored her and looked at himself in the mirror. His hair was all greasy and disheveled. His eyes were heavy and dull, and he didn't seem to glow as much as he usually did.

Minako noticed Jacky staring intensely into the mirror. "I think this rugged look is sexy," she said.

The door opened again, and they stepped out into a long hallway. Minako ran ahead, looking carefully for there room.

"Over here!" she shouted.

Jacky took his time walking gracefully up to her. He tossed the room card up to Minako and gave a fake smile, "You go shower…"

Minako opened the door and ran inside, throwing off her bag and leaping onto the bed.

Jacky closed the door behind him and turned on the lights.

"I'm gonna go shower now, no peeking," Minako said playfully. "Although I wouldn't be surprised if you did." She walked into the bathroom and turned on the water.

Jacky took off his knit sweater and folded it. He placed it on the nightstand next to his pillow. He looked down at his t-shirt. "I should probably shower too…"

He grabbed the pillow and went on the bed. Slowly he relaxed his body and closed his eyes. The room was silent except for the sound of water hitting the floor. Within a few minutes, he was fast asleep.

"Jacky, I'm done!" Minako said, bursting out of the bathroom. Her hair was still wet, and she had nothing but a towel wrapped around her. "Jacky, you asleep?"

She walked up to his body and smiled. "Idiot…"

Drops of water dripped down on Jacky's face, slowly he opened his eyes and tried to move. However he made no progress because Minako was sitting on top of him.

"Hello Jacky, and no I'm not one of your fantasies, I'm real." Slowly she leaned in towards his face and smiled. "I can tell I'm starting to break you…"

Jacky tried to get up, but his body was not fully awake yet. "I have no idea what will happen if she continues," Jacky thought.

"After all, you're still a man," she said while licking her lips. "And I have what you want…"

"Crap, why is my heart beating so fast?" he thought. Jacky stared up at Minako with a confused look.

"You know you can't resist."

He managed to get his arm out from behind his back and pushed Minako down. Then he sat up and pinned her down to the bed. His eyes were deadly, with one shining a bright bloody red.

"So you like to be on top eh?" Minako said nervously. She tried to shake him lose but he held her tight.

"This is what you wanted right," Jacky said while squeezing her shoulders.

Minako's eyes grew heavy, "Yeah, it is."

"Well now you got me, what else do you want…"

"I'm not sure, I didn't think I'd be able to break you. You have a lot of will power you know. I'm impressed."

"You thought I was some stoic robot who did whatever the boss said didn't you?"

"Pretty much," Minako smiled and relaxed her body. "But I seem to have finally gotten to the real you."

"I wasn't purposely holding back this whole time, it's just not my style to go all out…"

Jacky was getting sweaty, he could feel his whole body heating up.

"Your geass…"

"What about it?"

"You know that it's been activated for the past 5 minutes…"

"Really?"

"Yeah."

"I've been trying to get it to activate again every since it deactivated."

"It seems to only activate when you're annoyed." Minako looked right into Jacky's eyes. They burned with hatred and a desire for action.

"How about, I give you an early birthday present," Jacky said seductively. "Don't see, don't hear."

"No stop!" Minako shouted. It was already too late, she was all alone in darkness once again.

"Now you can concentrate just on me and my voice." Jacky pressed his body against Minako's and pinned her down tightly.

"Noo stop it."

"You were begging for this earlier, now you got it…"

Minako was scared, all she could see was Jacky's face slowly approaching her body.

"No no," Minako moaned. "Nooo…"

"Ok you can stop," Jacky said. He got up and walked into the bathroom. "I've got no reason to do anything to you." Jacky turned on the water and then took a shower. He finished and got dressed.

"Let me sleep for an hour, and then we'll go get Kurunoma…" Jacky spread himself down on the bed and closed his eyes. Minako turned on the TV and sat there, watching Jacky as he slept.

"What a dummy," she said with a smile.

After 30 minutes, Jacky was deep in sleep, not even the sound of a car crashing on the TV woke him up. Minako slid closer to Jacky and looked down on his sleeping face.

"Don't… leave yourself vulnerable like that," she whispered. Slowly she pulled back her hair and gently lowered her lips to Jacky's.

"I can't do this," she said, freezing two inches from his face. "It's not worth it…" She got up and put on her shoes. Minako slipped into the hallway and closed the door behind her.

"You awake you sleepy head?"

Jacky felt a bright light shining down on his face. Minako switched off the lamp.

"Sorry about that, you can open your eyes now."

Slowly, Jacky sat up and looked around. It had been two hours since he fell asleep.

"Are you hungry?" Minako asked. She was holding a pre-made bento from the grocery store. "I got you one too. I hope you like beef." She opened a box and took out a pair of chopsticks.

"Thanks," said Jacky. He got up and went to the bathroom. He washed his face and brushed his teeth. He came out and sat down next to Minako on the bed. "We're heading out after this ok?"

"Don't worry, I'm ready."

Jacky ate some of his rice and then put it down on the nightstand. "Ok let's go." He slipped on his sweater and shoes and headed towards the door.

"Wait!" Minako jumped up. "Shouldn't we think of a plan, or do you want us to just… wing it?"

"Do what you think is best, you're a good anti-assassin. Don't doubt yourself." Jacky put on the biggest fake smile he could conjure up. Then he opened the door and headed towards the elevator.

They stepped into the lobby and walked towards the front desk.

"Uhmm Jacky, keep the key, we have the room for the night you know… we can err come back here after." Minako clung to his arm and pulled him towards the door.

"Fine…"

"Look, it's that whore and that guy," said one of the front desk women.

"It's only been two and a half hours… they sure did it fast."

"They're probably going out to eat after using so much energy," the other one replied. They both giggled and watched as Jacky and Minako left the hotel.

Minako opened the trunk to get her vest, and began to strap all her weapons back onto herself. Then she joined Jacky in the car.

"Promise I won't get in your way." Jacky started the car and headed towards the city again.

"There's so much traffic," Minako complained. "We'll be stuck in this forever…"

"Just be patient, this gives you more time to think about the assignment."

The cars finally began to move again, and Jacky drove ahead. He headed forward until they passed a large luminous fountain.

"We're getting close," exclaimed Minako. "We're heading into the abandoned part of the city."

Jacky could see, straight ahead of them was an old shoe factory. The building was still in good condition, but it showed no signs of being inhabited.

"They did a pretty good job hiding their old training base." He parked the car two blocks down from the factory. Minako jumped out of the car and stared up at the large building.

"How are we supposed to find her in that?" asked Minako.

"I dunno, we'll just have to look around the whole thing." Minako grabbed Jacky's hand and followed behind him as they approached the factory.

"You're not scared are you?"

"No, I'm just feeding your masculine ego…" She looked up at Jacky and smiled. Slowly she began squeezing his hand tighter and tighter.

"Ooh I wanna do it," said Minako. She dashed up and kicked the door down. Inside the factory was dark, but there were portable lights scattered all throughout the hallway.

"We'll split up, unless you're too scared to…"

"I'm fine with that," said Minako. "I can search faster than you anyways…" She ran ahead and took a right. "I'll contact you if I find anything," she yelled.

Jacky picked up one of the lanterns and tried to turn it on.

"Hmm, they don't work." He walked ahead and took a left down a set of stairs. Jacky pulled out his gun and proceeded.

The wooden floor squeaked with every step Jacky took. He walked around a large room where lacing machines used to be.

"This is the side where the real factory was." Jacky turned around and dashed back up the stairs. "That means Minako is on the side with Kurunoma… crap."

Jacky ran back to where Minako took a left. There was now a metal door blocking the path.

"Dammit, she's walking into a trap." Jacky tried to kick down the door, but it didn't budge. Suddenly Jacky smiled. "This is good," he thought to himself. "If Kurunoma is only expecting one person, I can catch her off guard. Excellent…"

Jacky took out a wire from his pocket and took his time picking the lock. Behind the door was a fully lit hallway, with one door at the end.

"This is better than I thought," Jacky said, almost laughing. He walked up and twisted the knob. When he opened the door, he found Minako standing in a small 3mx3m room. There was a door directly in front of her, and there was a hallway to the left and to the right of Minako.

"What are you doing just standing here?" Jacky asked.

"Well I knew I walked into a trap when the lights suddenly turned on… and she gave me three paths to choose. I was gonna wait for either you or her to show up."

"Ok fine I'm here now so what do we do?"

"I dunno, split up again?"

"If you had just chosen one path to begin with, you might've finished and we'd only have the remaining two to check. We would've found her for sure…"

"I'm sorry Jacky… I just wanted to be cautious. It's not my style to rush things." Minako turned around to face Jacky. "What'd you expect…"

"Well we'll just have to split up again…"

"Fine be that way…" Minako stomped and headed towards the door.

"Wait Minako, come back… I'm sorry."

"What?? You're apologizing to me?"

"Yes, I shouldn't be so hard on you." Jacky looked at Minako with depressed eyes.

"Well it's going to take more than an apology, you hurt my feelings." She walked towards Jacky and stood there waiting for his response.

"I'm only so hard on you because… well I." Jacky suddenly froze, he felt his body tense up. "I love you Rose!" he said as he grabbed her. He pulled her in front of him and pressed his lips against hers.

Minako closed her eyes and embraced Jacky. "Don't feel pain when you're with me… I won't let you get hurt."

"He… he loves me," she thought to herself. "I'm... so happy." Minako felt the whole world melt away and her body heat up.

Right when their lips met, the sound of two gunshots rang.

Minako opened her eyes as two bullets pierced her back. She felt her limbs go numb like when Jacky took away her sense of touch.

"I'm… so happy Jacky. I love you," Minako whispered. Her legs grew weak as her life slowly slipped away.

"Yes I know…" Jacky looked held Minako for a second, then threw her lifeless corpse next to his feet. Jacky looked down and watched as Minako soaked in her own blood. Her face still had a smiling expression, as though Jacky was still kissing her at that moment.

The approaching shadow suddenly become Kurunoma.

"What a sweet sweet ending," Kurunoma said mockingly. "Too bad she doesn't know you used her body as a shield to save yourself."

Jacky looked at Kurunoma with cold eyes. "At least her last moment alive was filled with joy."

"Like you could care less how she feels," said Kurunoma. She stepped out holding her gun up high. "You and I, we're a lot alike. You just want to do your job right, you don't care about the lives of other people." "You saw my shadow coming, you knew you wouldn't be able to dodge a bullet in such a small space, and you used her as your flesh shield…"

"You make it sound so sinister," Jacky said. He raised his gun ready to shoot Kurunoma. "But you're wrong, I did love Rose… but my duty comes before my heart… (He seriously needs to watch Mulan 2)".

"I find that hard to believe," Kurunoma said with laughter. "In the end you still used her…I find that disgusting. An assassin is an assassin, no matter what side they're on. Their purpose is still to kill whomever they're asked to kill…"

"I'm a good guy… a hero. You're just a poor unfortunate soul." His eyes stayed locked with Kurunoma's. None of them moved an inch.

"You lost this battle because you failed to accept the fact that we're the same. Birds of a feather…" Kurunoma stepped closer to Jacky, not lowering her gun. "I got you…"

_**(Alternate Demonic Ending Starts Here!)**_

Jacky took a step back, there was nowhere to run in such a small room. "Crap, looks like I gotta take her on right here," he thought.

"You're out of options, this is the end for you." Kurunoma continued to move forward not looking away for one moment.

Jacky looked down at Minako's body again. He turned away from Kurunoma and closed his eyes as if he were praying for her. Slowly he pulled his gun from his pocket and held it by his side.

"You must be feeling cocky to turn your back to me," Kurunoma said. "I've never failed to take out my target…"

"I'm not feeling cocky," Jacky said timidly. "For once in my life, I feel… guilty." He kept his head turned from Kurunoma and bent down to Minako's body. "I feel guilty for having to waste such a wonderful life, a life which still had so much ahead of her…" He stood up again and turned to Kurunoma, hanging his head low in shame.

"An assassin who holds on to such feelings such as guilt is a failure. Using lives, taking lives… it's all part of the job description. You of all people should know that." Kurunoma cocked her head and smiled. "I guess when it comes down to it, you're just nowhere near my level. I'll enjoy giving you a slow painful death."

Jacky didn't move an inch. He stayed still, not shaken one bit by Kurunoma's taunting. "I probably deserve it."

"Let's have a bit of fun now," Kurunoma side stepped and pulled her finger down on the trigger. A bullet flew right past Jacky's head, just missing by a few centimeters. Kurunoma stepped back and lowered her gun. "I'm impressed, you have an abnormally powerful will. You've been able to withstand my provocation." Kurunoma extended her arm out and fired again, this time aiming towards the ground. The bullets flew by his legs and right into Minako's chest, causing her corpse to twitch. "You really need to loosen up man, I'll help you."

"That's what Minako said to me," he thought.

"Could it be you're not trying because you know I've won already?" Kurunoma said wickedly. "What kind of assassin gives up without a fight? Although I don't blame you… by now it probably seems hopeless."

"You're wrong…"

"What's that you said?" asked Kurunoma. "Tell me, what was I wrong about?"

"You were wrong about… EVERYTHING." Jacky lifted his head and pierced Kurunoma with his blood red eye. "I agree, we're nowhere near the same level, but not in the way you're thinking…" Jacky raised his gun and stepped forward. "You were wrong about your fated victory too, you lost the moment I was sent to assassinate you."

"That's a lot of talk for a child."

"God must've been against you from the start," Jacky said with a smirk. "Not only has he placed you under the guillotine, he's sharpened the blade too… And added burning hot iron spikes." Jacky quickly lifted his gun and shot Kurunoma's right hand. Her gun popped into the air and skidded across the ground when it fell.

"I see you're finally decided to play," Kurunoma said. "No big, I'll just finish you off now," she said while bending over to grab her gun. "

"You can try to finish me off now or draw it into a really dramatic battle. Although, I don't see the difference…" Jacky returned his gun to his side and stepped towards Kurunoma.

"W-what's happening, everything is dark… where's my gun, where's my hand!" she screamed. "What did you do to me…"

"Guns are troublesome," said Jacky. "Now you can… just focus on me." He kicked Kurunoma and knelt down to her level. "It's a gift from me"

"What did you do to me?!" Kurunoma screamed. "Get away!"

Kurunoma swung her arms wildly at Jacky, but there was no force to her blows. The shock of being trapped in darkness limited her movements.

"It's not my style to draw things out," Jacky said calmly. "I like to be efficient when it comes to my assignments."

"You coward, you have to blind me in order to seal your victory." Kurunoma looked up at Jacky. He seemed like a god towering over her while she was in a dark abyss. "Coward."

"Weren't you the one that said we were a lot alike, that we'd do anything we could to complete our job?" Jacky pointed his gun at Kurunoma. "I admit, that using my geass like this is cowardly, but I wanted you to suffer some before I killed you…"

"What did I ever do to you that would give you a reason to kill me."

"You're a villain, that's all the reason I need… and now you can pay for what you did to Minako." Jacky kept his gun poised for his finishing blow.

"I thought you wanted to get rid of her, she was a nuisance to you?"

"I became an anti-assassin to rid the world of rotten people like you," said Jacky.

"But in doing so, are you not becoming a rotten person yourself?" Kurunoma said confidently. "You deserve the same fate as me."

"If I'm saving the world, I don't care if I'm soiling my own hands in the process." Jacky yelled. "I just kept telling myself 'It'll all be worth it in the end', and eventually I started believing in that."

"Your beliefs contradicts your actions, in the end, you know that the world will turn against you, like it did with me. What will you do then?"

Jacky paused for a second to think of his response. "When that day comes…" Jacky murmured. "I will already be regarded as a hero." He pulled the trigger and watched as Kurunoma's head exploded all over the floor.

Jacky stood up and walked over to Minako's body. He bent down and touched her cold hands for the last time, and then headed towards the door. He walked back through the bright hallway and back to the entrance.

Jacky reached into his pants pocket and pulled out his phone. He dialed the number and then stepped through the gaping hole where the front door used to be.

"Hello Director Tsunda," he said clearly. "I have completed the mission."

Jacky slowly got into his car and started the engine. He threw his phone into the backseat and stared at the empty passenger side.

"I'm sorry Minako, I mean… Rose," Jacky said while looking up at the sky. "A hero... can't always save everyone." He put his hand over his left eye and watched as the clouds cleared away from the moon. "Every time I think about you… all I can picture is your lifeless body." "But I guess it's better that way."

Jacky closed his eyes and tried to conjure Minako's smiling face. But all he could see was her body sprawled across the floor, marinating in her own blood. He stared at her dead body, until he heard her voice."

_My real name… is Natsuhi Rose. It's a dumb name isn't it?_

Jacky looked into the mirror and stared at his reflection. His eyes were heavy and sorrowful, but suddenly he smiled. "A bloody Rose… exists within my mind…"

Happy Birthday Jacky!!!

On the next two pages is the alternate ending. I originally wrote that ending, but after reviewing it with my editor we decided that it was too twisted and sadistic. Therefore, I rewrote the ending, but I just really think that the original ending was very very well written. I kept it here so you could read it. It begins where it says "Alternate Ending Starts Here". So when you want to read the alternate ending, when you see that "Alternate Ending Starts Here" thing, scroll down to pages 24 and 25. I hope you enjoyed the story. I worked very hard to make it special just for you!~

"No, you lost this battle because…" Jacky laughed and then lowered the gun from his face. "You don't see the truth."

Kurunoma suddenly fell over, "What the hell, everything is… dark." Kurunoma tried to stand up, but she could not see what she was doing. "I can't see myself."

Jacky stepped in front of her. "It's ok, all you have to see is me…"

Kurunoma raised her gun at Jacky, and attempted to fire. "What did you do to me?" she screamed. "You have to do this to me to win, you coward…"

"Aww, you missed. Your aim must've slipped after so many years of not being on the field." Jacky smiled and knelt down to Kurunoma's level. "I'll trap you in a world of darkness." He licked his lips and smiled. "I don't wanna hear your excuses. I'm simply using what God gave me…"

"Dear God, please take away the cruel curse you've placed on me by taking away my sight, and NOW my hearing," Kurunoma screamed.

"Now you can focus, just on me… there is no god that can save you now." Jacky took Kurunoma's hand and made her tighten the grip on her gun.

"Don't TOUCH ME!" she screamed. She pulled her arm away and shot in all directions, hoping Jacky would die.

"You said, 'don't touch me'??" Jacky kicked Kurunoma in the stomach. "But you wont know that I did that would you?"

"Please stop, I'm begging you… I'll do anything, I'll give you thirty million yen. Please stop doing this to me…" Kurunoma was sprawled across the floor, wriggling around like a worm.

"It seems your muscle memory is failing you… here, let me help you up."

Jacky shoved Kurunoma against the wall and sat her up.

"This is your punishment for being a villain, for being evil…" Jacky laughed. "This is your punishment for killing Minako, although I don't blame you. She was a nuisance…"

"NO stop it. Don't kill me… please," she whispered.

"I would never kill you…" Jacky stood up and shoved his foot against Kurunoma's face. "No… I'm not gonna kill you." He knelt back down and smiled.

"Really?"

"Yup yup! You're going to commit suicide," said Jacky with a cheerful grin.

"W-what?"

Jacky lifted Kurunoma's jelly like arm up. He took her hand with the gun and held it right in front of her face.

"You might not have noticed, but you're holding your own gun up to your face. You must be really upset to want to kill yourself…"

"I don't understand…"

"I wont start with your head though…"

Jacky took Kurunoma's hand and pulled her index finger down on the trigger. He made her shoot both her legs and her stomach.

"Oh, you didn't even scream in pain…now time for the finale." Jacky raised her hand up to her head. "And the hero slays the villain again!" Jacky yelled. "Don't worry, you wont feel a thing."

He pulled her finger down on the trigger, and deactivated his geass. "Or maybe I lied."

Kurunoma gave out a yelp of pain for a second and a half before her head exploded all over the wall.

"Argh…" Jacky sighed. "You got blood all over my favorite sweater."

He stood up and headed back down the brightly lit hallway. The night was quiet, not even the sound of traffic reached the factory. He stopped at the entrance and pushed a black button on the wall.

"Please enter self-destruct code," said an automated voice. Jacky took out his gun and shot the keypad.

"I hate codes…"

"The building will self-destruct in 60 seconds… 59,58,57…"

Jacky walked through the gap where the door used to be and started heading back to his car. He looked both ways before crossing the street to his car and opened up the trunk.

The factory behind him exploded and caved in, burying the bodies of Minako and Kurunoma. Jacky didn't even look back once.

He stepped into the car and took out his cell phone.

"Hello Director Tsunda, I've completed my assignment. That is all." Jacky dropped his phone onto the floor and looked over at the empty passenger seat.

"Minako… Rose I mean. All that's left to remind me of you is the memory of your bloody body."

Jacky looked at himself in the mirror and fixed his hair.

"But it's better this way," he said with a smile.


	3. Chapter 4 : The Two Sides of Life

Anime Wars

Chapter 4

The Two Sides of Life

The cold pavement outside was topped with a layer of delicate snow. Soft flakes dropped from above and slowly collected on the ground below. The naked trees swayed slightly as another gust of wind tore through the air. The familiar roaring gales skidded and twirled along and finally sat calm again, allowing the snow to collect peacefully on the chilling grass.

"Squish squish, poof poof," Victor said, and he trudged through the sidewalk. The crunching flakes smashed against the bottom of his shoes as he continued to tread down the sloping hill. "Pretty clouds, you're so gray… cheer up ol' pals… it's only snowing!" He quickened his pace and fell silent as he waited to cross the street. The backpack and gym bag on his shoulders swayed as he took his last rushed step. His large shiny eyes went dull, the normal beautiful brown that shimmered like polished wood, became glazed as he spaced out. The road up ahead was lined with restless cars; all headed on their way to various jobs and schools… the usual morning commute. The traffic light suddenly "pinged" signally the also busy people to cross the street.

Victor awoke from his trance and continued his walk, not noticing that the light was green by the time he was halfway across the road.

"Hey man, walk faster. Get out of the road," someone said, honking like a mad man.

Victor turned around and just stopped. He thought for a second, replied "Blehhhhh…" sticking out his tongue, and running away as fast as he could. The sound of traffic faded behind, like the gentle ending of a ballad. He hummed quietly to himself, his train of thought lost; trying to remember what he was going to do that day. Another gust of wind ripped through, the small trees around seemed to be bowing down, their tops almost touching the floor. The numbing chill hit all of his limbs, and his hat was now flying across the street, into parking lot of a busy restaurant.

"Dammit… this sucks. Why do I even have to go to school when it's snowing? I'd be happy to have just stayed at home, or fail… dammit what the hell. Stupid snow, stupid wind, stupid hat!" His steps turned to stomps as he paraded across the street like an elephant. The hat landed on the rear-view mirrors of a truck; it was now covered with snow, inside and out. Victor shivered as he placed it back on his head. Drops of water began sliding down his neck to the back of his shirt, causing him to shiver even more.

"God it's cold," he thought. Victor could see the top of the school observatory up ahead. It would be only another fifteen minutes until he arrived.

The roads up ahead were barely plowed, and thick layers of snow had frozen over from the frigid air. The ground below him seemed to crack every time he took a step, causing his foot to sink four inches.

"Fuck the snow…" he thought.

Victor lifted his foot one more time and ran as fast as he could until he reached a shoveled area on the side walk. His shoes and the bottom of his jeans were now drenched in melted snow. A small grin appeared when he looked back at all the holes that were stomped into the ground. Victor fixed his scarf and shoved his red hands into his jacket pockets.

The small shops were all lit and almost empty. The only busy store on the street was the town bakery; which was releasing its hearty aroma across the block. Victor could not help but look over to where the smell was coming from. Some people inside were enjoying their breakfast, chewing slowly and enjoying every bit of their muffin or bagel. Others were busy yelling at someone on their phones while they struggled to mix their coffee. And then there were the employees trying to keep a happy face while serving what Victor thought was a mob of chaos.

Victor quickened his pace and kept walking up the street. Houses all around him were all busy shoveling their drive way so they could go to work. The next five minutes of walking was filled with the sound of shovels scratching pavement. He occasionally had to stop walking when a car pulled out of the. By the time he reached the end of the street, his feet were numb from previously being wet.

"I hate this, why can't my dad trust me to drive in the fucking snow? It's not like I'm gonna swerve into a building. It's not like he can control me like a slave." Victor kicked a mound of snow pushed against someone's fence, scattering small snowballs across the frozen road.

"Hey man, don't kick snow into the road. Cars have to drive there ya know…" someone yelled from behind him.

Victor kept walking and lifted his left hand to his ear, they were cold and numb. "If you haven't noticed, it's still snowing… snow's gonna pile up there anyways," Victor yelled. He turned around and did a short wave, then spun around and kept walking. He had now reached the street of alleys.

This particular street was filled with tall apartment buildings that were connected to small cafes. Every twenty feet there would be a small gap between the buildings filled with trash, and occasionally teens smoking weed, or whatever they could get their hands on. He began to walk slowly with his chin buried in his scarf.

Whenever Victor passed an alley he would look down and peer into the emptiness. It was a filthy type of emptiness, alone because it's too dirty, too smelly, too lewd, too unappealing.

"Good morning son," said a sick, raspy voice. Victor looked across the street and saw a short old woman holding a cigarette. "You braving the cold?" she said after a loud coughing spasm.

Victor smiled and gave her a friendly wave. "Good morning, I'm doing fine, just freezing my ass off."

The old lady did a loud and violent cough or laugh, whatever it was, Victor couldn't tell. "Good luck dear," she shouted.

The snow began to fall faster, and the wind began to blow violently. He could feel the world around him suddenly close up and retreat back home. The shoveling noises behind him faded away completely, and he could here the complaints of many fathers trying to get to their jobs.

Victor looked around as everything grew quiet. Even the wind was unusually soft for the current weather.

A small clacking noise suddenly grew louder and louder. It sounded like claws on tin. Suddenly the trashcan to the right of Victor tipped over.

"Holy shit," Victor said. He could feel his heart suddenly jump and then begin to beat really fast.

The trashcan began to bark at him, but it wasn't a violent bark. They were friendly barks followed by soft breathing.

"Hello?" said Victor.

Out came a small puppy with chestnut brown fur. The dog shook wildly to get all the snow off it's body. Its ears perked up when it saw Victor. Slowly it began to approach him.

"Hey there, what're you doing here buddy?"

The puppy suddenly stopped and turned its head. It barked a few times, and then ran to Victor's legs.

It barked again and then backed away. Victor looked down at it and smiled. Suddenly his eyes widened and his smile grew larger.

"It's a shiba!" he said in a happy tone.

The puppy sat still and stared at Victor. Around it's neck was a shiny blue collar filled with gold tags.

Victor knelt down and looked at the puppy. As he reached his hand out to pet it's head. The dog bowed it's head in anticipation.

"You're a friendly doggy aren't you boy… or girl," Victor said happily. He brushed his hand across the dog's soft head a few more times and then began to look through the tags.

"You're owners are probably going crazy after losing such a cute puppy," said Victor. "But they didn't even write their address on these things?"

Victor was now really confused. The tags all said odd things. The first one had "Meow MEOW KITTY!!" written on it; and the second tag said "Fast, Swift, and Sleek" the last 5 tags were all blank.

"How weird," Victor thought. "How am I supposed to find your home then?"

The shiba got up and walked behind Victor.

"Whoa where ya going?"

It ran back to the garbage can and laid down inside.

"Hey, you can't sleep here doggy. It's too cold." Victor walked over and gently tapped the trashcan. "C'mon doggy get out."

The puppy didn't listen to him, it stayed inside.

"I'll give you food if you come with me!" said Victor. He opened his backpack and took out his lunch. Carefully, he ripped part of his sandwich off and held it in front of the dog. "Still not coming?" he groaned. Then it suddenly occurred to Victor. What would he do with the dog while he was at school?

"I could always explain it to one of the teachers and have someone watch him…?" Victor thought.

"Ok fine, you can stay here but not for long. I'm coming to get you after school." Victor said softly. He petted the puppy to check and make sure it was still alive. He then took off his scarf and put it around the dog's neck, while draping the ends over its body.

"Hopefully this will be enough to keep your warm," said Victor. He could suddenly feel how cold it was outside without his scarf. It must have felt five degrees cooler to him now.

Victor attempted to escape the cold by walking faster and faster. For the rest of his walk to school, he stared at his shoes the whole time. When he finally got to school, he saw a group of people he knew standing out front.

One of them waved at him from across the street. "Hey Victor, come here and wait for the good news with us," one of them yelled.

Victor waved back and quickly made his way up to join the group.

"What are we waiting for?" he asked.

"Mr. Dawson just announced that they might let us out from school early because of freezing in the English and History wing."

"Seriously?" asked Victor. He took off his hat and fixed his hair, shaking water onto the people next to him.

"Hey watch it, you're getting me all wet man," said a girl next to him.

"Oh sorry Ashley I didn't mean to get you that excited," Victor said with a perverted grin.

"Shut UP you perv that's not what I meant…" she said while slapping his arm.

"Ok ok whatever you say," Victor said amongst the laughter.

"Wait wait Victor why are you so late today, did you sleep through your alarm because you were dreaming about getting a lap dance?" someone asked.

"Whoa that was only once, and it was a very pleasant dream in fact; she had a nice ass," Victor said smugly.

"Nice man… nice"

"No, I had to walk here today cause my dad wouldn't let me fucking drive since it was snowing," said Victor.

"Oh right, I just noticed that you didn't come in your car today," someone said.

"Right right," said the rest.

Victor continued his story. "He's afraid that I'll swerve on ice and then hit a building or an orphan or something like that. What bull."

"Man that sucks, if I were you I would've just drove to school anyways."

"Yeah, I was gonna do that. But my dad took the keys from my room and put them in his pocket." Victor put his frozen hands into his sleeves.

"What an ass," he added.

"Oh damn that's extreme. He must be serious about it then."

"No shit…" Victor replied.

"If it were me I would've been like 'you'd rather have me get hit by a car then let me drive? What a great father' and then grabbed the keys from him," said Ashley.

"Yeah yeah Slutty, why don't you just screw your dad to get your keys back?" someone yelled.

Victor couldn't help but laugh at that comment.

"You guys are all asses, what did I do that's so slutty?" she asked.

"Yeah I don't really wanna answer that," Victor replied. "So you can just have fun thinking whatever you want."

"Fine whatever, I don't wanna talk about it anymore," said Ashley.

"So when are they gonna fucking tell us if we can leave or not?" someone complained.

"I'll kill the principal if the school collapses on me while I'm in class," one girl said.

"Just shut up and wait," said Victor.

Everyone seemed to have nothing to say anymore, and awkward silence hung over all their heads.

"If you guys have nothing to say, I'm gonna go inside," said Victor. "I'm so fucking cold." He rubbed his hands together to emphasize his coldness.

Nobody said goodbye when he left, they just stayed in their silent circle. He walked into the school and found an empty window with a heater.

"Ahh this is better," he said while leaning his back against the chilled glass. Victor closed his eyes and waited for a voice to tell him he could leave.

"You're gonna roast your balls if you sit there too long." A tall girl with long, black, curled hair came up and sat on him. "How are you today Victor," she said.

"Julia… you're crushing my foot with your twenty pound shoes," Victor said, with his eyes still closed.

"Hold on a second, I have to tell everyone that I found you." She took out her phone and then closed it within a few seconds. "Ok done."

Julia got up and pulled Victor up from where he was sitting.

"C'mon big boy, lets go somewhere quieter."

Victor stood up straight and stared her down. "I don't really feel like doing that now, call me back later when I'm in the mood," he said.

Julia walked closer to him and got right up into his face. "No silly, somewhere quieter so we can hear if we can leave or not."

Victor pretended to look shocked. He shrugged and said, "I thought you were coming onto me. My bad."

"Yeah well it was a little bit of both," she quickly replied. She said it so quickly that it was almost incomprehensible. "Now let's GO!"

She dragged Victor into an empty hallway which connected the English department and the Tech. department, and also led to the library.

"Isn't this better?" Julia asked rhetorically.

"It's a little… private don't you think," Victor said with a smirk. "I think I know why you brought me here now."

"Good, cause Mandy and Jay and Shelly are on their way!"

"Hmm… you seem a little too hyper right now, did you get drugged?"

"Who knows, I did eat a really good muffin this morning at the bakery though," Julia said while cracking up.

Victor held both her shoulders so she couldn't move, and looked her straight in the eyes. "You sound like you haven't had enough to drink," Victor said in a serious tone.

That made her keep laughing until everyone arrived. They all stared at her, until they did their usual hellos. Jay was the first to say something. She put her hands on her hip and gave Victor a funny look.

"Victor… what'd you give her?"

"She was already like this when she found me," said Victor. "I just said something funny."

"That's the thing Victor," said Shelly. "You're not funny."

They all started laughing, when suddenly Julia stopped.

"Ahaha so funny," Victor said sarcastically. "Now that everyone has finished being hilarious, let's get on with whatever we're gonna do."

"Yeah, what ARE we doing here Julia?" asked Mandy.

Julia stood up and fixed her hair. "Ok so I was thinking that if we get to leave early, we should all hang out together and do some fun shit."

"Ooh what kinda shit we talking about?" Victor asked.

"The kind that you like, lazar tag and movies and loitering at the mall!" Julia exclaimed.

"Aha funny story," Jay said awkwardly. "I have double chem. next and Dr. Wallis swerved into a building or something. If we can leave early I'm spending the day with Joe."

"Jay!! You ruined everything… wait, which Joe?" said Julia.

"Uhmm… Joe my boyfriend?"

"Fine, Jay you're excused."

"Ok Julia it's my turn I guess," said Shelly. She looked over and Mandy and made a nervous smile. "Unless Mandy wants to go first!"

"Not you guys too!" Julia moaned. "You guys take the fun out of all fun days, for me at least…"

"Sorry Juju Randy made me his slave for today," said Mandy.

"Oooh Mandy that sounds fun," said Shelly.

"You'd think so, but it's actually not. He's probably just gonna drag me across the city to look at stores and go shopping."

"So you mean you guys wont…?"

"Nope."

"Ok Shelly I'm ready for ya," Julia said depressingly.

"I have to uhh tutor my neighbor."

Julia crossed her arms and gave a look of disbelief to Shelly. "Honey… he's in college. What could he possibly learn from you?"

"Hey, I'm at the top of our class. But I'm hoping nothing," she said with a wide smile.

"Can't you spend the afternoon with your own boyfriend?" asked Jay.

"Who do you think I asked first?!" said Julia. She banged her fist against the wall and prepared to tell her story. "But apparently he has pick up his grandmother from the hospital and bring her home safely or whatever."

"Aww," said Jay. "It's always got something to do with his grandmother doesn't it?"

"I KNOW!" Julia exclaimed. "She needs to hurry up and die or something."

Victor finally stepped in. "Ok you hoes have fun with your afternoons, I'm gonna go and find something to eat." He stretched his arms and began to walk away. "Yeah and Julia, I don't really wanna be your plan B so good luck with that."

"Alright, at least I know Victor isn't going to sneakily run off to another guy instead of hanging out with me!" Julia said happily. "Unless there's something you want to tell us Victor, do you have some unknown 'buddy'?"

Victor sighed and stepped back into the circle. "If you must know, I have a date with my fridge and then I have a nap waiting for me."

"Aww c'mon Victor you really want to hang out with Julia don't you?" asked Julia.

"Yeah Victor, don't be so cold hearted. Don't abandon your friend!" said Shelly.

"Isn't that what you guys are doing too?"

"Dude what does she have to do, buy you lunch?" said Jay.

"That would be perfect!" said Victor. "How about it Julia. Lunch date today?"

"You guys are so mean, you know how much he eats. It'll cost like all the money I have just to feed him for lunch," Julia cried.

"Do you don't want me to hang out with you today?" asked Victor. He hugged her for a second and then waved goodbye. "Then I'm leaving, see ya."

"Ok fine I'll buy you lunch, but you have to pay for whatever we do after that. Got it?" said Julia.

"That sounds fair I guess."

"Ok you two have fun," said Jay. "I'm gonna go meet up with Joe and wait for the announcement."

"Have fun Jay, don't do anything you'll regret," Victor said.

"Don't worry I will," she replied.

"Julia, there's always the chance that we'll have to stay in school all day," Shelly said to try and comfort Julia.

"Shelly are you retarded… there's practically an ice storm in the right wing. Someone will probably die in their."

"Yeah you're right, so I'm gonna leave before you get really depressed or angry," said Mandy. "Let's go Shell."

"Ahh good idea, buh bye guys have an awesome time!" Shelly said before running off.

"Aww Julia you wont really become a mood swingy monster will you?" Victor said in a cute voice.

"I might," she replied while sniffling.

"Alright this wont be worth it," said Victor. He turned around and headed the direction Shelly and Mandy went. "I'm out, have fun hoe."

"Wait Victor, I was only kidding!" Julia yelled. "Don't make me hurt you."

"Yeah ok, good luck with that," Victor said. He didn't turn around, and just gave her a wave goodbye.

Victor could hear quick and heavy footstep suddenly chase behind him. Julia jumped up and put her arms around Victor's neck while locking her legs around his waist.

"I told you to come back Victor, you better listen to me ok?"

"Ok whatever you say." He kept walking with Julia still on his back.

"Damn, why'd I have to be so skinny," said Julia.

"Whoa whoa whoa, don't flatter yourself. It feels like I'm being crushed by an elephant. I'm just so awesome I can walk with an elephant on my back."

Julia put her lips right next to Victor's ear and whispered, "Haha if you weren't so funny I would've thought you called me fat. You're lucky I'm in a good mood right now."

"I bet I could make it up the stairs," Victor said confidently.

"Oh really, so there's some muscle under all that fat of yours."

"Ahaha funny," said Victor. "If I had low self-esteem I would've killed myself just now."

"Just go already," said Julia.

The speakers suddenly "pinged" and the principal's voice came up. His voice was deep and overfriendly.

"Hello students. Right now is the end of first period. For those of you who had history or a language class, I hope you enjoyed your free period. As for the situation in the right wing, the crew working on it feels that it's too dangerous for students to be there. Now we could do the usual and assign you guys to different rooms for free periods--"

"Oh damn, he better not do that," Julia yelled.

"But in order to fix this problem they will need to cut off power and water throughout the school. Along with that, the heat will also stop working in a few hours. Therefore the superintendent decided that it would be impossible to have classes here today.

"Yes yes yes!!" Julia yelled again.

"School will be let out at third period. That is the lunch period, and busses will come and take you guys home. As for students with a history or language class second period, your teacher will assign you to a room for a free period. That means for seniors, you are free to leave right now if you have a class in the right wing next.

"Please be careful on the roads, they are very slippery. Please be especially careful leaving the parking lot and remember not to drive too fast. Thank you."

"Well isn't that wonderful," said Victor. He looked up at the long flight of stairs and took a step back.

"Don't die if I fail horribly at this," said Victor. "Here I go."

"Wait wait Victor, on second thought, this is really dumb. I'm getting off," Julia said nervously.

"Too late," Victor said with a wide grin. He began running up the stairs as fast as he could, trying not to tip over. At the same time, Julia began screaming very loudly.

When they made it to the top, Julia jumped off of Victor and slapped him across the face. "You idiot, that was an extremely horrible experience."

"Was it? You were screaming so loud I couldn't think," Victor replied.

"Because of that, you're not getting a drink for lunch," Julia said boldly.

"Aww c'mon that's not fair, what am I supposed to wash down all the food with?"

"Toilet water should suit an ass like you," said Julia.

"You're impossible to deal with. If we weren't going out for steak I'd be very annoyed."

"What steak?!?" Julia cried.

"Yeah, that's what I'm craving, and it's easy to eat without a drink so…" Victor patted her on the shoulder and took her hand. "Let's go."

"Oh fine you get a drink."

"Sweet, now let's get out of here. Somebody probably thought you were getting raped or something," said Victor.

Julia took Victor by his jacket and dragged him to the main entrance of the school. They looked out the window and saw that the parking lot was a mess of cars all trying to get out at the same time.

"Ok we'll wait here until it clears up," said Julia.

"Fine with me," said Victor, while taking his usual position on the heater. "Wake me up when you're ready to leave."

"Hey, don't really fall asleep. You're impossible to wake up," said Julia.

"How would you know?" Victor asked, with his eyes still shut.

"My thirteenth birthday party. I lied to you about the time so you could come over and help me set up," said Julia.

"Oh yeah, I remember that. You made me clean the area around your pool and hang streamers in your house," said Victor. He smiled and crossed his arms. "What a bitchy thing to do; and why was it only me?"

"Hey, Mandy and Marvin came over too. You were just outside."

"What's with Mandy and matching named boyfriends?" Victor said mockingly.

"I have no idea," said Julia. "It must be like an OCD or something. Anyways, I remember you fell asleep on my couch. My mom found you and didn't want to wake you up; she thought that it would be weird."

"That would've been extremely weird to find your mom waking me up. That's like being molested by your mother," said Victor.

"Hey shut up, that's why she didn't want to do it. So my mom told me to wake you up since the party would be starting soon. I went up to the couch and I tried yelling at you, shaking you, tickling you, everything…"

"Whoa, so you felt me up while I was sleeping?"

"Don't say that," said Julia. "It's not exactly like that."

"Just tell me how you woke me up already," Victor said impatiently.

"Well nothing I did woke you up, and you were just so adorable back then," said Julia. "Not nearly as cute as you are now though."

"Why thank you."

"So to wake you up," Julia said in a hushed tone. "I kissed you." She stepped back and smiled. "And you woke up, just like in Snow White."

Victor opened his eyes and saw Julia heading out the door. He got up and followed her into the snow.

Victor stared at the back of Julia's head as she walked away. It was very awkward for Victor to actually think about, once he imagined the scenario in his head.

"It was a nice kiss, even if you weren't conscious. I enjoyed it a lot," said Julia.

"Now I find that really hard to believe since you cut out your heart and sent it to those fags in My Chemical Romance," Victor finally said.

The two had reached the parking lot, and were now on opposite sides of Julia's small white Honda.

Julia sighed and opened the door. "You can believe what you want," Julia said in an overly sarcastic tone. "As long as only I remember it, I can use it to tease you for the rest of your life."

"I knew you sexually assaulted me before," said Victor. He put on his perverted smile and reached his hand towards her menacingly. "And it was while I was sleeping too. That's kinda kinky ya know."

"Oh dear, I had no idea two kids kissing would turn you on so much," said Julia.

"Well it did, you better be ready for me," Victor retorted.

They both got into the car, and Julia pulled out of the parking lot. She quickly turned on the radio; which made some grungy song blast from the speakers.

When she finally found the right station, she turned down the volume and buckled her seatbelt.

Victor just turned to his right and stared out the window, watching people still try and plow their driveways.

"Well this is gonna suck, my mom's gonna make me shovel the front yard when I get home." He kept his attention on what was happening outside the car.

"Well your parents are getting old. Be a good son and help them out a bit."

"I don't see you doing it, yeah that's right… so don't bitch at me."

"Alright, sorry."

The car stopped at a red light. Julia took her hands off the wheel and pulled down the mirror. She took out the clips and hair extensions; all that was left was disheveled hair. Julia took out a brush from the cup holder and slowly began to brush out all the knots in her hair, until it was back to its usual straight appearance.

"What are you doing?" asked Victor. He turned around and scratched his head, picking up the hair extension after he finished "Why is there a mob of hair right here?"

"Shut up, I'm trying to fix my hair for our lunch date," said Julia. She didn't take her eyes off her reflection, and continued to fix her hair.

"You don't have to get all pretty just for me," Victor said with a hint of perversion. "It'll just get messy again later, right?"

"Ahaha funny," said Julia. "But a date is a date, and I take my appearance seriously if you didn't notice."

"And I'm supposed to let you drive while you're doing your make up?" Victor took the brush from Julia and put it between his thighs (Author's Note: What I really meant was crotch, but it sounds weird to put something in your crotch no?)

Julia grabbed the brush back without hesitation and continued to brush her hair. "This light is a little over five minutes. I have plenty of time to do this."

"Whatever just stop wasting your time then."

The light turned green right when Julia put down her brush. She took another few seconds to run her fingers through and check if everything was perfect.

The mirror hit the top of the car with a slight thump, and Julia quickly followed the cars ahead of her.

"About time," said Victor. He was looking at his hands and fingers out of boredom, carefully scanning over for anything cool.

"So where do you want to eat?" Julia asked cheerfully. "Try to keep it under fifty bucks cause I really can't afford to blow more than that on lunch."

Victor pretended not to hear and continued to look at his fingers. He was now sunk back all the way into the seat, with his head below the head rest.

"Hey, I'm asking what you wanna eat you fat-ass. Tell me now or we're going to McDonalds."

Victor sat up and fixed his jacket hood. "We'll eat wherever you want to," Victor said in his cool voice. He sat back with his arms behind his head and smiled.

Julia laughed. "Oh dear. What am I going to do with you."

"So where are you taking me eh?"

"Hey hey, I'm taking you out for lunch. You get to choose!" Julia said enthusiastically. "I know, we'll go get Thai food. My dad got take out from this Thai place last week, and it's not that far from here."

Victor let out a deep sigh and started playing with the strings on his jacket. "Look, I already said that you can choose. So just choose already; please… I'm starving."

"Ok ok if you say so," said Julia. She put her hand on her chin as though she was going to go into a state of deep though. "I got it. We'll go to Greek Fire. I haven't been there in years."

"That place doesn't even serve Greek food," said Victor.

"Dude I hate Greek food, so that's a good thing."

"It's pretty upscale though," Victor said mockingly. "You sure you can afford taking me there?"

"Hey, if I make my dad pay for gas one week, I'll be good."

"Alright, let's go then," said Victor. "Just so you know, if you couldn't come up with anything, I was gonna say Friendlys." He patted her on the shoulder and shook his head. "But this works too."

"Bitch… you say that right when we get here," Julia said with friendly annoyance. "But whatever, I'm the one who chose this place so let's go eat!!"

The restaurant was full even though it was snowing. Most of them were business lunches, or coworkers trying to escape the heat of work by indulging in expensive burgers and fries.

The people were quietly chatting amongst themselves, making sure not one drop of their conversation leaked to the table next to them.

"You know, in this place you can pick up on a lot of hot gossip and scandals," said Julia. She cupped her mouth and leaned over to Victor. "That woman at that table over there," she said while pointing. "The one with the red streaks. She just said that she's having an affair with the wife of the owner of the Chip-City Creamery."

"Eh, that's hott," said Victor. He smiled back and kept close to listen to what else she had to say.

They walked up to a podium and were greeted by a tall and well built man with a shaved head. "Hello welcome to Greek Fire. How can we serve you today?"

Victor leaned over the podium and took a look at the man's silver nametag. "Hey 'Brichard' table for two please."

"Right this way please."

Victor and Julia followed him to the back of the restaurant where a small, dimly lit, table waited for them. He placed two menus on the table and pulled the chair out for Julia.

"Enjoy your meal."

When he left, Julia shot a cynical look to Victor and kicked him under the table. "How can you be that obnoxious at a restaurant like this? I mean… what the hell was Brichard?"

Victor shrugged and leaned in to see Julia's face clearly. "Hey don't bitch at me, his fucking name tag said Brichard, so that's what I called him." Victor leaned in even closer. "I can't fucking see here, did they take out the lights to save money or something?"

"They just turned on the lights back here, they should be on in a few minutes," said a waitress passing by. She was wearing long heels and a skirt that only a waitress would be wearing. In her hands was a stack of large and heavy-looking plates.

"Thank you Miss. Please excuse my friend here," Julia said embarrassingly. She sat all the way in her chair and began looking around at all the other tables.

There weren't many couples in the restaurant, but the ones that were there were either being very intimate, looked like they didn't want to be there, or looked like they wanted to take their clothes off.

Julia glanced at her watch, and then scanned the restaurant again. "Maybe we shouldn't have come here."

Victor looked up from his menu and gave Julia a funny look. "Why, the food looks really good," said Victor. He turned around to admire a plate of chicken being brought to the table left of theirs.

"I don't know, just something about the atmosphere, the ambience. It's unsettling." Julia picked up here menu and began to flip through it as well.

"We might as well eat since we're already here," said Victor, while stuffing his mouth with bread. "Or we can leave after snatching some more rolls."

"I guess nothing can stop you once you start eating."

Victor put another roll onto his plate. "That is not true."

Julia shook her head and sighed. "You don't even know how long the bread has been on the table for. It was here before we got to the table you know."

"Nah, they're fresh."

"And how exactly do you know that mister?"

Victor took Julia's right hand and placed a roll into it. "Feel how warm they are, that means that they're fresh right?"

Julia stared at the bread and felt it's heat radiate throughout her palm. "It's also warm where he's touching my hand too," she thought.

"So like I'm thinking about ordering the savory pork chops, but the name and description seem suspiciously misleading," said Victor. He flipped over the page in the menu and continued to browse. "But I'm also not sure what this house seasoning is supposed to be either."

"Victor, calm down. It's just food."

"Wahh this menu confuses me, and is it getting hot in here or what," Victor said while taking off his jacket. "They must've just turned on the heat on this side of the restaurant too."

Julia put down the menu and took a nibble of the bread. "I think I'm in the mood for fried calamari. Wanna split it with me?" She looked up and saw Victor rolling up his shirt sleeves; he was having a hard time getting his right sleeve to stay up.

"Wow you retard, need me to help you?" said Julia.

"Nah, I got it."

A waiter in a well tailored suit appeared at their table with two glasses of water. "Sorry about the delay, can I get you anything to drink?"

Victor sipped his water and put on a look of dissatisfaction. "Could you get me ice water with a lemon?"

"Ok, and for you Miss," said the waiter.

Julia smiled and opened up her menu for a reference. "I'd like a diet coke, and could I get this fried calamari for us to share?"

"Ok, and what would you like sir," said the waiter.

Victor grabbed Julia's menu and flipped to the last page. "Alright, I'm interesting in this double chocolate fudge cake. Is it really heavy and rich in chocolate?"

The waiter gave an awkward look at Victor, but caught himself before Victor noticed. "I'd say that it is a bit heavy," said the waiter. "And the chocolate is very rich and uhmm creamy."

"Sounds good, I'll have that with a scoop of that uhmm hazelnut ice cream on the side."

Julia kicked Victor's shin as hard as she could under the table. The impact made the floor vibrate for a second, causing people to look over at their table. She put on a nervous smile and shrunk into her seat.

The waiter picked up Victor's water glass and faced them one more time. "So one ice water with a lemon, a diet coke, fried calamari, and a fudge cake with hazelnut ice cream on the side."

"That sounds about right," said Julia.

The waiter was about to leave when he remembered one more thing. "How spicy do you want your calamari?"

"Oh, I didn't know it was spicy," said Julia. "I guess medium would be fine."

"And you sir, would you like to have your cake served the same time as the calamari."

'That would be… delightful. Thank you," Victor said mockingly.

The waiter left and went into the kitchen. The restaurant suddenly grew really quiet, even the background music was hard to hear.

"You're just enjoying being obnoxious today aren't you Victor?" said Julia. She had a face that looked pretty angry, but her voice seemed a bit calmer than she looked. "So you had me take you here just so you could eat cake and ice cream?"

"Hey look, I couldn't think of anything else to order. Would you rather I get something that I won't even eat?"

"This whole time I thought you were really hungry, but I guess I misjudged you."

Julia put her elbows on the table and slowly began to eat through the rest of the bread. "Well this isn't how I expected."

Victor put a mint in his mouth and relaxed in his chair. "I know this is so boring; the service here sucks."

"It's only been three minutes, be patient."

The waiter came out and placed their drinks on the table. Behind him was girl in a white blouse and an unusually short skirt with a plate of cake.

"Here's your ice water with a lemon, and your diet coke," the first waiter said. He stepped out of the way and let his coworker put down the dessert.

As she stepped back, she looked at Julia and mouthed something to her. Victor wasn't quite sure what happened, but Julia replied with a "Thanks".

The two employees stepped away, from a distance, Victor could hear a small bit of their conversation.

"That's the guy I told you about," the waiter said.

The girl looked back at their table and giggled. "He's cute. But a guy like him has to be kept on a tight leash; his girlfriend seems to have a lot to deal with."

Victor paid no mind to their comments. He began to dig into his cake and soon found himself with chocolate of various parts of his face.

"Could you try to eat a little neater?" Julia complained. "Unless the chocolate on your ear and chin are for later."

Victor lifted his fork from the plate and glared at Julia. "You just let me fully enjoy the cake that you're paying for, and I'll play good boyfriend afterwards."

"Fine, but could you at least clean yourself up, it's embarrassing."

Victor picked up the napkin and smudged the chocolate on his face into various places. He then continued eating until Julia grabbed his fork.

"You need me to wipe your face for you?" asked Julia. It was clear that she was annoyed, but something about the situation made her unable to feel angry.

"If it'll make you happy, then be my guest."

Victor threw down his fork and spoon onto the table and took a sip of his water. He took his napkin and handed it to Julia. "Here you go."

Julia took the napkin and attempted to scrub the chocolate off with force. Little of the chocolate came off, and what did come off dropped as chocolate skin flakes onto the table.

"You're squishing my face, it kind hurts."

"Just hold still and turn your head this way."

Julia took the napkin and wet it with Victor's water. She began to dab the chocolate with the wet napkin, so it would un-harden and come off when she wiped it.

Meanwhile, people at surrounding tables were distracted by this small scene.

"Isn't it adorable how she looks after him like that?" one of them said. They couldn't help but smile and feel a comforting warmth.

Julia got back into her seat and placed the napkin in a ball by her coke. "I swear, sometimes you're just like a child."

"What's wrong with that?" Victor said between chewing and swallowing.

"Nothing," Julia replied, feeling defeated. "It's just that; I dunno… I thought we were all adults by now, that's all."

She sat back as the waiter placed the calamari in front of her. She could immediately feel the steam rise and hit her face.

"I guess we're not quite adults yet, but just… special children."

Victor began to notice the mood dip towards depressing. Something about what they were doing did not feel quite right to them, or at least Julia didn't seem right.

"Have a bite," he said, sliding his plate towards Julia. He watched her as she took a small scoop of ice cream and a chunk of cake all in one swoop.

"It's actually really good," said Julia.

Victor smiled and sighed. "You know, at this point, I'm not sure titles like child and adult should really matter. Everyone will still be a bit immature or very immature for a while. We will still be ourselves when we're adults."

Julia could final feel that Victor was being serious about something. She put down her fork and looked up at Victor. "And what are you trying to say?"

"Well I meant that Victor should always be Victor, and Julia should always be Julia. We shouldn't change because we're supposed to be adults or whatnot." Victor took his plate back and put it to the side.

"Sure we'll definitely be different fifteen years from now, but while we're here, we shouldn't be looking ahead that far. Let's just enjoy the benefits of being not quite a child, but not quite an adult."

Julia didn't say anything, she sat still not knowing how to respond. This was a side of Victor that occasionally came out, but on a whole other level.

"Bah, I don't know what I'm saying. C'mon and try that calamari." Victor took his chocolate covered fork and stabbed it into the calamari. He chewed on it for a bit, and when he finally swallowed, he went for his water.

"It's actually pretty spicy," said Victor.

Julia took a piece and put it in her mouth. She could immediately feel the spiciness.

"Whoa that's hot, just the way I like it." Julia followed up with a huge scoop of calamari, and then a sip of her coke.

"I think you're right Victor. Although I'm not sure if what you said had much relevance to what I was feeling."

Victor shrugged and picked up his fork. "I tried my best." Victor lowered his fork to finish off his cake, but just before the fork made contact, Julia snatched away the plate.

"You know Victor, as a child, you're hard to deal with. But as an adult, you're even harder to deal with. It's a bit scary."

"Why thank you, I think you should award me with some hot steamy sex," said Victor.

"Alright time for you to be mature again," said Julia.

Julia handed the empty plate back to Victor and sighed. She waved for the waiter to come over and then brought her attention back to her friend.

"Aww c'mon, you know you want some," said Victor.

The waiter came up and stood up straight in front of their table. "Yes, how can I help you?" he said.

Julia pointed at her plate and then looked up at the waiter. "Yes, I'd like the check, and could you wrap this up for me."

"Certainly, I'll be right back with this," he said while picking up the plate.

"You better not run away when the check comes, you're my ride home," said Victor.

"That sounds like a wonderful idea, but I won't do that to you again," Julia said slyly.

The waiter came back with a small box inside a plastic bag, and a small black bill holder. "Thank you and I hope you enjoyed your meal. Please come again."

Julia took the bill and scanned through all the items listed. "Hmm, a lot less than I thought it would be, since I planned on you eating a lot."

"Hey hey, let me see it," Victor said, trying to grab the bill from Julia.

"Fine," said Julia. She handed him the bill while she searched for her wallet in her bag.

"Oh, almost thirty-seven dollars," said Victor. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a twenty dollar bill.

"We'll split this one," he said while slapping down the money.

Julia took the bill and handed the money back to Victor. "I said I'd take you out to lunch, so I'll pay for it. Don't worry, I have money."

Victor wiped his lip and then got up to put on his jacket. "Let's just split it and leave already."

"Ok you win this round," said Julia. She threw another twenty and a five in and closed up the black booklet.

"Hurry up and put on your jacket," said Victor. "I'm bored of this place, let's go do something interesting."

Julia slipped on her jacket and followed Victor towards the exit.

"Alright, let's go," she said while grabbing Victor's left arm.

They made their way through the tables back to the front entrance. Most of the people had left already, but there were a few people just walking in as they were leaving.

They finally got to the front and made their way to the door.

"Good bye, have a wonderful afternoon," the man at the podium as Victor was holding the door for Julia.

Julia stopped to take a good look at him. His teeth were somewhat crooked, and he needed to shave a bit. He was wearing a white tuxedo with a black bowtie, along with a shiny silver nametag. Julia smiled and waved good bye.

"Good bye Brichard," she said as she left.

The two walked out into a heavier storm. Julia's car was covered by a half inch of snow, but the wind wasn't acting up so it was quite nice outside. Julia unlocked her car and got into the driver seat, while Victor got in the other side.

"Where are we headed to?" asked Victor. He pulled on his hat and buckled the frozen seatbelt over himself.

"I think we should take a walk down Beat Street," said Julia.

Victor furiously rubbed his hands together to warm them up. He shoved them in his pockets and shivered. "That sounds great," he said in a frozen breath.

"Alright here we go then," said Julia.

They drove for ten minutes in the snow, and came up to a large parking lot filled with cars. Even in the midst of a storm, Beat Street was still bustling with business. The two got out and headed towards a wide street filled with people.

Beat Street was essentially an area were street vendors sold CDs, original and pirated; drums, gongs, and other musical instruments. There was also the occasional palm reading stall, and psychics trying to pull you in with their tarot-card fortunes.

"Let's check and see if they have any new CDs," said Julia. She pulled Victor up to a stall with racks and racks of CDs and began looking through.

"Ayumi Hamasaki's new album came out not too long ago, so they should have it. I just love the song Glitter."

Victor browsed for a bit, but quickly got bored when he couldn't find anything he was looking for. He began to drift to the next stall.

"Hey wait up Victor," Julia said while chasing after him. "Don't just leave on your own; I get worried when I can't find you."

"Oh sorry, you looked like you were enjoying yourself, so I didn't want to bother you." Victor began walking away when he felt Julia take his hand. He slowed his steps and began to glance around for anything interesting.

Julia trailed behind while almost being dragged by Victor. Her left hand began to feel really cold. "What exactly are you looking for Victor?"

"Nothing in particular, just browsing I guess?"

They kept walking and walking, not stopping for long at any of the stall. They stopped at a drum stall and played with the tambourines and maracas. They stopped at a DVD store to search for cheap anime. They were stopped three times by palm readers who were trying to sell them their future; they refused. After about fifteen minutes, they were almost at the end of the road. They hadn't let go of each other's hands the whole time.

"What now?" asked Julia. She looked to the left and right, stalls on both sides were the same as the ones up ahead.

"I guess we turn around," said Victor. "Unless you don't want to." He turned and looked down to meet Julia's eyes.

"I uhh, am not quite sure," Julia said weakly. She felt her face get really hot and let go of Victor's hand. Her palms were all moist and sticky. "What am I doing," she thought.

"Soo what do you wanna do?" Victor asked.

"Oh right, yeah we should probably turn around." She pulled her jacket sleeve over her hand and began to follow behind Victor.

"Wait hold on," someone cried out. "Come back here."

Victor turned around and saw someone waving at them from a booth.

"What do you think she wants?" asked Julia.

"Maybe she wants me to hook her up with a good time," said Victor.

They walked up to where the person was waving from. The backdrop of the stall said "Fantasy's Fortune", and there was an old lady sitting behind a crystal ball.

"Thank goodness you came back, I saw something very interesting in your future," the old lady said with a creepy smile. "Come come, sit sit."

Victor and Julia stayed outside the tent, they looked at the old lady, and then each other.

"Sorry lady, we don't wanna have our fortunes told, even if they are very interesting," said Julia. "Thanks for the offer though."

Before they could even think about leaving, the lady cried out again.

"Wait!" she said. "This fortune is particularly interesting, so peculiar that I will give it to you free of charge."

"Should we go in?" asked Julia.

Victor walked in and sat down without responding to Julia. He looked around and saw nothing special about this psychic. Suddenly it occurred to him.

"Hey, you're the old lady that was smoking this morning!" Victor exclaimed.

"Wait, so you know her?" asked Julia. Victor gave her a tired look and put his attention back on the psychic. "Well it's just for clarification, no need to give me retarded looks."

The old lady closed the curtains and the tent was suddenly dark, illuminated by a few strings of Christmas lights.

"So we have met before," said the old lady. "And its fate that has brought you back to me at this moment!"

"Do you say that to all your customers?" Julia asked sarcastically.

"Well if you must know, then yes, I do pretty much say it all the time. But this time I mean it!"

"Hey, just cut to the fortune. This is free so you're not trying to sell us anything," Victor said in an anxious tone.

"Ok ok, what an eager boy," said the old lady.

"Tell me about it," Julia added.

"I am Madame Ga," said the lady. "And right now I will share with you this most interesting future which I have foreseen for you."

She dimmed the lights and pulled out a sheet of paper and a pen. Slowly, she began drawing lines on the paper, while waving her other hand over the crystal ball.

"What is it that you want to know the most?" Ga asked. "You want to find out about love, wealth, happiness, test answers perhaps?"

"Didn't you say that you've already foreseen a future for us?" said Julia. "So why don't you just tell us what you saw already?"

"Ahh but that's where you're mistaken, you said 'us' when all I have predicted pertains to him," she said while pointing at Victor.

"What'd you see about me?" Victor asked curiously, trying to peek at the crystal ball himself.

Madame Ga kept her head down, with her eyes on the paper, even as she spoke. "It's a most tragic future you can say, one filled with choices. Not difficult choices, but the true answers become most easily shrouded.

Julia grew tense, she was beginning to feel drawn into the mysterious atmosphere. "What's going to happen to him?" she asked.

Ga picked up Victor's right hand and placed it on top of the crystal ball. It felt cold and icy, but also very fragile. "Pick it up boy," Ga said.

Victor held it carefully with both hands. He tried to move the puffs of darkness inside by shaking it, but the smoke still continued to flow mysteriously.

"It seems that you are quite an unlucky boy," Ga said slowly. She was still scribbling away on her paper, but now Victor could make out some images.

"A head? Possibly a person," Victor thought.

"You will have to make choices," Ga repeated. "You will either find love at the cost of success, or success at the cost of love. Quite a predicament, don'tcha think?"

"Does that mean that I'll either have love or success, not both?" Victor asked.

"That's precisely what it means," said Ga.

"But Madame," said Julia. Madame Ga did not look up, so Julia spoke. "What if he finds love in success, and success in love?"

"Darling, that is quite a bright way to look at this situation," said Ga. "But do you realize how almost impossible your words are?"

"I don't think they sound that impossible," said Victor. He touched the crystal ball again, as if it would change what has been said.

"Well boy, first of all, do you believe in what I've told you?" asked Ga.

"I kinda do," Victor said nervously.

Madame Ga finally stopped her pen, and looked up. She gave the same scary smile and laughed. "Well then believe in what that girl has said too boy, and you might just have a chance."

"What?" Victor asked. "You're starting to confuse me."

Madame Ga flipped over her paper and began to scribble again, this time even faster than before. "Boy, I will give you a gift for your words here. I shall add you to my story." She put down her pen and pushed the paper a little towards Victor. He could see people on the paper, the same person in many different panels.

"Are you a mangaka too?" asked Victor.

Just when Madame Ga was about to speak, a phone rang.

"Oh, I'm so sorry," said Julia. She took out her phone and checked the caller ID. "It's my boyfriend."

"Greg?" Victor asked.

"No my other boyfriend," said Julia. "I'll take this outside real quick."

She pushed through the curtain and let in a gust of cold air.

"All this time I thought you were her boyfriend," said Ga.

Victor looked at Julia's empty seat and responded. "Really, did you really think that?"

Madame Ga laughed and slapped the table. "Of course not, what kind of psychic would I be to get even relationships screwed up."

Victor laughed along nervously, and waited for Julia to come back.

"I can see that she likes you though, a lot in the friendship kind of way, but also a bit of her feelings are more than that," said Ga.

Victor looked at Madame Ga carefully, and then back at her drawing. "Do you really think that?"

"Of course I do, and you do too. You have very similar feelings to her, you probably don't realize how much you like her."

"Are you sure?" asked Victor. He could feel himself begin to blush.

"Alright maybe I was exaggerating a bit, but I can feel it. It's definitely there."

"I guess that's something new to hear," said Victor.

"Don't worry dear, Madame Ga has found another woman for you. One that will cherish deeply and carefully covet."

"Wait, what are you talking about?" asked Victor.

Madame Ga lifted the paper and held it up to her nose. "My decision is unquestionable, my words are final, and your destiny is sealed." The paper burned almost instantly, leaving behind a lavender scented smoke.

"I don't understand anything you just did," Victor asked. "What was the meaning of all that."

Madame Ga took out a silver chain from her pocket. "She has already begun to search, and this will help you find her."

"Hold on, I need an explanation!" Victor yelled. "Please?"

Madame Ga finally stood up, she looked frightening in the dim lighting. "Be thankful that I changed your destiny for you and leave. You have someone waiting for you outside."

Victor picked up the chain and left; Julia was just about to walk in and get him.

The crystal ball on the table began to clear, and an image of Victor walking down a sunny street appeared.

"It seems I have successfully added you to the cast of my production," Madame Ga said to herself. "Let's see how well you fare in my world now."

Victor's image disappeared into the smoke and mixed with all the other faces in the ball; two young adults just beginning their lives, brought together by research and bound by passion; a young girl trying to figure out which ways is up, and which direction points straight to hell; a teen boy engrossed by shadows; a soulless business man who never misses his target; a graduate blessed by a fallen angel; a beautiful face surrounded by ugly hearts; an outgoing quiet-girl who can't keep things in place; a proud musician that's lost in dreams; and many others suppressed in the mist.

Madame Ga smiled as she saw all the faces disappear back into the darkness. Slowly, she lifted her pen and held it to her nose.

"It seems old characters are bringing in new faces," said Ga. She took the pen and stabbed it into the crystal ball. The crack seemed to moan as all the darkness was absorbed into the pen, leaving just a broken glass ball.

When the last of the darkness was gone, Madame Ga began to change. Her wiry gray hair grew long and dark, hanging just above her butt. Her wrinkly skin tightened and changed to a pale tan color, and her body grew tall and slender. After a few minutes, Madame Ga now looked sixty years younger and twenty times more sinister.

"As mangaka of this world, I'll try my best to create an entertaining story," she said to herself. "I've set the rules and boundaries, now it's up for you guys to write in yourselves."

"Greg called to check if I was still out. He says that we should get home soon since the storm is going to get ten times worse," said Julia.

"What a caring boyfriend," said Victor. He wasn't exactly happy to be out in the cold again, but he did really want to go home now.

They began to walk back when Victor felt something pulling on his jeans. He looked back to find a small fluffy dog wrapped in a red scarf.

"Oh shit I totally forgot about you," said Victor. He leaped down to pick up the dog, who didn't feel cold at all.

"It looks like the scarf worked," Victor said happily. The dog licked his face and gave friendly barks.

"Victor don't pick up random dogs, it could be someone's pet," Julia complained. "You don't know where it's been"

Victor held the puppy gently in his arms and began to walk.

"Victor! Are you listening to me?" asked Julia. She caught up to him and stayed on his left side.

"Don't worry Julia, this is the dog that I found this morning on my way to school. Although I have no idea how it managed to track me down to here." Victor looked at the puppy that was now asleep in his arms. The dog heated up his chest and made the snowy air feel more comfortable.

"Oh, well do you plan on bringing that dog into my car with you? Cause I know someone else who would say otherwise," Julia said sternly.

"Aww c'mon Julia, he's got nowhere to go. And you just said the storm is gonna get ten times worse."

Julia thought for a second, but gave in when she thought about it rationally. "You're lucky I have a heart, and a soft spot for cute puppies."

Victor smiled and gave Julia a shoulder bump. "Alright, you rock Julia. I will never forget the day you saved a puppy."

The puppy stayed asleep for the rest of the way back to the car, and for the whole ride back to Julia's house.

"I need to stop at home to pick up some stuff," said Julia. "Shelly felt bad and said I should stay over her house tonight."

"Am I not invited to this sleepover?" asked Victor. He opened the car door and secured his grasp on the dog. His eyes were fixed onto the black clouds that began to seem over the city.

"Maybe next time," she replied. Julia went up to unlock her front door and waited at the door for Victor. "Hurry up, you're letting all the heat out."

Victor kicked the snow off his shoes and walked inside a brightly lit house. The radio was playing softly in the kitchen, and the sound of running water came out from the bathroom.

"I need to go up to my room and get some stuff, I'll be right down." said Julia. She walked up the stairs and disappeared behind a coat rack.

Victor sat down on the couch and gently rocked the dog that was beginning to wake up.

"Hey there little guy, you still tired?" Victor said gently. He could feel the dog begin to stir and fidget so he put it down onto the floor. "Don't pee on the carpet."

Small bits of ice began to blow off the ground and hit the window, causing it to clatter. The wind began to push the gently falling snow into chaos. It blew so wildly that the house across the street became obstructed by the snow.

Julia's mom stepped out of the kitchen and placed the plates onto the table. "It's really coming down out there," she said.

Victor moved his attention from the dog to his friend's mother. "Hey Mrs. Wei," Victor replied. "This is just the beginning of the storm, it'll get a lot worse in an hour or so."

Mrs. Wei took a seat by the coffee table and picked up her coffee. She took it with her to the window and pressed her head against the cold glass. "It already looks really bad, any worse and the whole town will be buried in snow."

Victor stood up and went to the staircase, he looked up at a small wooden table with a stick up bamboo standing by itself in a vase.

"You know Victor, I almost didn't recognize you. You haven't come over in years, and you've grown a lot," said Julia's mother. She placed her mug back onto the coffee table and began to search through the stacks of books over in the corner. She started by taking a heavy load from the top, and made her way down to the books at the bottom.

"Well I haven't really had to chance to hang out with Julia much since we started high school," said Victor. "But it's not like we don't see each other a lot at school."

"That's good to hear," said Mrs. Wei. "You're a good kid, very friendly and a very caring person." She finally chose a book and wiped off all the dust.

"No, I'm a lot worse than I appear to be," Victor replied. He somehow felt embarrassed by what he just heard.

"Everyone has a side like that, a part of themselves that indulges in the darkness in life," said Mrs. Wei. "But nonetheless you are a very sweet boy, and I have something I'd really like to show you." She opened up the book, which turned out to be a photo album, and began flipping through the pages. It was filled with happy faces and warm smiles, feelings that could not be captured anywhere else.

"Here it is," said Mrs. Wei, finally stopping on a page. She took out the picture and took a good look at it.

"As a mother, this is just something you remember forever," she said. Julia's mother handed Victor the picture and waited for a response.

He held it in his hands and carefully examined the photograph. It was a sunny day, the house was decorated in pretty colors, and a boy was asleep on the couch with streamers covering his legs. Right next to him was a girl in a pink and green dress, hovering above his face. They both seemed to be smiling at something.

"Do you recognize this?" asked Julia's mother. "Well of course you don't, you were asleep."

"So it's true then?" asked Victor. "She kissed me?"

"Well I can't say for sure, I don't know what happened," said Mrs. Wei. "I had just fixed the camera, and I was going to see what was taking so long for Julia to get you. I heard her saying 'hey hey wake up wake up' and hitting you with a pillow."

"She's always been really violent," said Victor. "One time she threw a tape dispenser at me because I wasn't paying attention to her story."

Mrs. Wei smiled and continued speaking. "So anyways, when she couldn't wake you up I was about to step in, when I saw her scan the room for people. I didn't want to walk in on something intimate, and I sorta knew what she was going to do, so I hid. By the time I checked to see what had happened, I was too late. She had already done it, and she was probably now lost in that adorable sleeping face you see in that picture."

"So as her mother, you felt you needed to take a picture of it?" asked Victor. "Not to be disrespectful or anything, it just seems kind of awkward."

"Well, when I saw you two together, I had one of those fantasies. I saw what every Chinese mother wants the most for their daughter, and I was sort of lost in the moment you see," said Mrs. Wei. "I had thought for sure that you two would be together, but something tells me that your paths have separated."

Victor touched the pendant in his pocket. The cold metal made his fingers numb, but something about the feeling seemed familiar to him. "You know, I probably liked her for a long time, but never realized it."

"But now you've found someone else?" asked Mrs. Wei.

Victor thought for a second. He didn't want to say anything that would mislead her into thinking one thing or another. "I have no idea, it feels like everything is upside-down today," said Victor. He watched the puppy jump up against the window. It seemed anxious and started barking very loudly.

There was a sudden gust of wind against the window, followed by a large booming thunder.

"That must be the sign that the weather is going to get worse. I've never seen lightning in a snowstorm before," said Mrs. Wei.

"Yeah you're right, I should be getting home. As soon as Julia is done that is," said Victor.

Mrs. Wei went to the staircase and turned on the hall lights. "Julia," she yelled. "Hurry up and drive your friend home, the weather just got really bad."

"Alright, I'm ready. Get ready to leave Victor," Julia yelled.

Victor put on his jacket went to give Mrs. Wei a hug. "It was nice to see you again, good night."

Julia ran downstairs with a pink duffle bag and her car keys. "Sorry about that Victor, I couldn't find a few things."

Victor went up to the window and picked up the restless dog. "Are you hungry or something?" he asked. The dog resisted him at first, but calmed down after a bit.

"Bye mom," said Julia.

"Bye Julia, don't drive too fast ok," said Mrs. Wei.

The two slipped on their shoes and jumped out the door. The snow hit them almost immediately, and they covered their face with one hand as they tried to get to the car. About three inches of snow had already piled up since Victor arrived at Julia's house, and his shoes were now all wet again.

Victor struggled to open the car door while trying not to drop the puppy. He couldn't seem to grasp the handle while his hand was in the sleeve.

"God dammit," said Victor. He finally just pulled his hand out and yanked on the door. It flew open and snow started to collect on the seat.

The car was cold, and the seats were now moist, which made everything feel uncomfortable. Julia buckled up and started moving as soon as Victor got adjusted.

"This side of town is always last to get plowed," complained Julia. "So fucking annoying."

The windshield wipers were furiously swiping away, pushing all the snow to the side. Up ahead, the roads were free of cars, and the storm seemed vicious.

Another crash of thunder broke through, and this time Victor could see the lightning too. It hit in the small forest area up ahead, just a few blocks from Victor's house.

"My god, that struck really close to us," said Julia. "Did it hit a tree?"

Victor held the dog close to him and closed his eyes. "Something feels really uncomfortable," he thought.

They made it past where the lightning struck and were now almost at his house. The car kept sliding on the frozen slush, giving an uncomfortable swerve every now and then.

A huge flash suddenly appeared behind them, immediately followed by a deafening rumble.

Julia looked back and zipped up her coat. "I swear, that just struck in the same place."

Victor pressed his head against the seat and adjusted his position so that he could exit easily.

"Run to it," said quiet voice.

"What'd you just say?" asked Victor.

Julia didn't look over at him. "I didn't say anything."

He heard it again, in the same hushed tone. "Run to it."

The car pulled into a large, recently shoveled, drive way. The car gave a small screech when it came to a complete stop, and Julia unlocked the doors.

"Good night Victor, if you need me, just call me," said Julia.

"Thanks for the ride," Victor responded. He pulled up his hood and lifted the dog. Carefully, he opened the door and stepped outside. He could begin to feel the puppy squirm in his arm, but he kept his grip tight so that it would not run loose.

Another blast of thunder ran through the sky, and was beginning to fade away by the time Victor got to his door.

"Bye Julia," Victor yelled. He waved good bye, and watched as Julia drove away and disappeared into the snow.

The dog finally started barking, causing Victor to drop it onto the snow. It rolled over and shook rampantly.

"C'mon doggy, get in," said Victor as he opened the door.

The dog didn't move, instead it sat still, staring at Victor.

"You sure are difficult to deal with," he said. Victor stood there staring back at the dog, hoping it would follow him in after a bit.

Finally he heard it, loud and clear inside his head, the words "You're being tested."

"I must be getting sick," thought Victor. "Why do I keep hearing noises," he Victor.

"You're not hearing noises," Victor heard. "It's me, down here."

Victor looked at the dog funny, and laughed. "You're a talking doggy eh?"

The dog got up and ran towards the mailbox. "I don't talk like you're talking right now, but you can hear what I'm saying."

"Wait what?" said Victor.

"I'm Pikachu, I'm Pikachu… and you're being tested," said the dog.

"This isn't making any sense, first of all you don't look like a pikachu. And second… I shouldn't be able to hear your thoughts or your voice or whatever. And lastly, I don't understand what you mean by test."

"Run to it," Pikachu said again.

After a few more minutes of standing in the cold, the dog finally ran off towards the forest.

Victor slammed the door shut and took off after it. The only thing he could see through the snow was a bouncing tail.

"Wait up, I can't keep up in the snow," Victor yelled.

They kept running and running, they turned into the forest. Pikachu didn't slow down at all, he kept weaving through the trees until they reached an empty plot of land.

The ground was icy instead of packed with snow, and the air pressure seemed to increase once he stepped through.

"What are we here for?" asked Victor.

"I already told you, you are being tested," said Pikachu.

"You didn't explain anything to me… Pikachu," he replied.

"You must not remember, you were added to her collection," said Pikachu. The dog shook off the scarf and stood in the center of the ice ring. "She made you a character in her story, but is now regretting her decision. Therefore you're being tested."

Victor wanted to run from there as fast as he could, but something in him kept him still. "By she, did you mean the fortune teller earlier?"

"I don't know who you're referring to, but the person that created me is willing to write you into her world," said Pikachu. "You'll just have to pass this test, and I'm telling you now, you don't have a choice."

A bolt of lightning came down and landed right behind the dog. Victor jumped down and covered his ears. He could feel the vibrations spread throughout the ground.

"Get up," he heard.

Victor was still deafened by the hard thunder. He stayed on his stomach, sprawled across the ice.

"I said get up!" Pikachu ran up and began to scratch at Victor's sleeve. Victor didn't move. "Actually it's better if you stay down, this way you wont be anticipating anything."

"What?" Victor asked as he began to regain his hearing.

"I'll try to explain this to you in as much detail as I can," said Pikachu. "You'll become a main character in the story as soon as you pass this test. The main characters are specifically chosen to shape the plot of the tale, with the world being the setting."

Victor got onto his knees and looked up at the sky. It looked like the darkness within the crystal ball. "What exactly must I do for this test?" asked Victor.

"That's easy, you just have to survive." Pikachu jumped on his back at sat down. Victor suddenly felt a humongous pressure on his body and began to lose feeling in his hands and legs. His vision began to go and soon all he was left with was his hearing.

The sky sounded like it was gargling, Victor could no longer hear the howling wind, or the scraping ice.

"So all I have to do is survive this?" asked Victor.

"Oh no, this is just to make sure you don't run away," said Pikachu.

Victor suddenly felt really tense. There was an endless cycle of chills running all over his body, and sweat was beginning to form on his forehead.

"Have you done this before?" Victor asked nervously.

Pikachu was silent for a moment. "There were two before you, those two I chose myself. But this time is different, you chose me instead."

Victor suddenly thought back to when they first met. All he thought was that Pikachu was a cute little puppy. "So you were waiting for someone to find you?"

"In a way, yes," said Pikachu.

"So in a way I pretty much screwed myself over?" asked Victor.

"You can look at it that way," said Pikachu. "Anyways, stop talking it's about to begin."

The silence lasted for 3 minutes, it was shattered when Victor sneezed.

"God it's too cold out here," said Victor.

This time, the thunder came before the lightning. Victor's hearing went out before he was impaled by thousands of volts of energy.

"I think you're doing well," Pikachu said after the lightning faded. "You haven't screamed yet which is a good sign I think."

Victor began to feel a warm sensation spreading over his back. Slowly, the darkness around him began to show itself, and the numbing died away.

"When you can move your hands again, tell me. The last two died right about now," said Pikachu.

"Is it supposed to smell like hamburgers?" cried Victor. He wiggled his fingers and attempted to get on his feet.

"Good job Victor, it seems you passed," said Pikachu while jumping off his back. But this time the voice was different. It was friendly and heart warming. It made Victor not feel alone out in the forest.

"Pikachu, what just happened?" Victor asked. He got on his feet and examined his reflection in the ice. "I still look normal."

"Unfortunately, your destiny has now been sealed," said Pikachu. "But you will find many good things coming up soon. Thanks to you I have been reborn from your feelings."

Victor looked down at the dog and smiled. "I don't know why, but I feel really good right now."

"I don't know why," said Pikachu. "But I can hear the voice of your inner child telling us to keep moving forward. It's a feeling of immense strength."

"Interesting," said Victor. "So as a main character of this world, what do I get?"

"Close your eyes and imagine me," said Pikachu.

Victor closed his eyes and began to imagine an adorable puppy. His mind began to focus.

"No no," said a voice in his head. "I'm Pikachu remember, that's not pikachu."

Victor took a breath and tried again, he imagined an adorable yellow pikachu. He felt a sensation in his stomach which spread to his arms. It tingled in his forearms until he could feel small sparks, stinging his palms.

"Thundershock," Victor yelled. He opened his eyes, and two large sparks of electricity shot out fifty feet in front of him.

"That's sick," exclaimed Victor.

"That was cool," said Pikachu. "It seems that you yourself have become a pikachu like me."

"So does that mean I have all the attacks that pikachu has?" asked Victor. He cracked his knuckles and prepared to jump.

"I guess so?" said Pikachu. "I've never done this before so I wouldn't know."

"Agility!" yelled Victor. He ran forward at godly speeds and then leaped into the air, soaring hundreds of feet up. He seemed to stop moving in the air for a few seconds, and then continued his arc downward.

When Victor landed he was right in front of his house again. Sixteen inches of snow had gathered from the blizzard, and now there was a large snow crater in the front yard.

Pikachu showed up at his feet not soon afterwards. "That was amazing," said Pikachu. "You were like a blur, definitely too fast too be seen."

Victor smiled and picked up his dog. "So will you be staying with me little buddy?"

"I'm sorta stuck with you either way," said Pikachu.

Victor walked into his house, and got the carpet all wet.

Victor's mom met him with a cold glare. "Where have you been?" she yelled.

"Out with friends," Victor replied.

She looked like she was just about to yell again when she saw the dog. "Oh my gosh you took our adorable little dog with you?!" She ran up and snatched it from Victor. "Did Victor hurt you buddy? Cause if he did I can punish him for you?"

Victor stared at his mom in shock. He had expected her to put up a large fight on whether to keep the dog or not. "What's up with that?" asked Victor.

Pikachu escaped and chased Victor to his room. "Your destiny has been rewritten," said Pikachu. "Whoever brought us together must have also rewritten your reality."

Victor took his jacket off and jumped onto his bed. He got creeped out when he realized what Pikachu was saying. "So anything in my life can be changed just like that?"

"Pretty much."

Pikachu jumped up and snuggled under Victor's arm.

"So tell me what you know about this person who supposedly created you."

Pikachu put his head down and thought for a while.

"I guess it begins with creating the cast and choosing the characters. Then it goes to creating a plot and a climax, and then choosing a fitting conclusion."

"So you're saying this person controls the world?" asked Victor.

"Not the world, but reality," said Pikachu.

Victor slammed his fist on the bed. "What gives this person the right to change whatever he wants, any way he'd like," Victor said while yawning.

Pikachu cuddled into a ball and closed his eyes. "She can do whatever she wants, cause she's the mangaka."


	4. Chapter 5 : How it Brings You Closer

Anime Wars

Chapter 5

**How it Brings You Closer**

Geo turned slowly in bed, opening his eyes and glancing into the darkness of his room. The sun was not yet up, and the sound of bugs flying about leaked through the walls. He turned again and stared at the still shadows protruding in all directions. The wind broke out with a howl, and tossed around the tall trees, causing the thin shadows to quiver.

Geo sat up and looked at his alarm clock.

"Still too early," he said. His head fell back down to his pillow and let his eyes close tightly. Geo slept soundly in his small room, cluttered with paper and clothes. His face had an innocent expression as he dreamt.

The sun outside flowed sluggishly up into the sky, signaling the beginning of an almost summer day.

_Bring, bring bring_

The alarm went off, and Geo slammed the snooze button. The ringing stopped for a bit, but 10minutes went by before Geo could get 2minutes into another dream.

"I hate school," he thought. The biology test thrown askew on the floor crumpled under his feet as he got up. That day, Geo was having an exceptionally fine day, and managed to get every questions right as well as the bonus. It's weird how one of his only A's ended up on his floor.

The morning sun stung his eyes as he stepped into the bleached white bathroom. Every corner was shiny and spotless, due to the constant cleaning done by his mother. The other rooms were almost never cleaned, like Geo's room, but everything works out fine.

Geo stopped in front of the sink to check his hair in the mirror. There were patches of black hair sticking up like troll's hair. After staring at his reflection for a moment, he went and turned on the sink.

The water came out with a loud hiss. He quickly brushed his teeth and washed his face. The hot water dripped smoothly down from his face and into the sink.

"Geo, you almost ready?" said his mom. She peeked through the door wearing a dirty old sweater and a food splattered apron. "If you want to be driven to school, you must follow my schedule to ensure you'll get to where you're going on time."

"I'll be down in 5 minutes," Geo yelled back. He dashed into his room and opened his clothes shelves. Slowly, he slipped on a small red t-shirt with a pair of slender khaki shorts.

"Ready yet?" his mom called out. "Hurry hurry."

Geo could hear the car start out in the driveway. He looked out the window and saw his mom loading her bags into the car.

"That woman is always in such a hurry," he mumbled. Geo grabbed his backpack and jumped down stairs. He stopped in front of the door to put on his shoes. Slowly, he turned his head back and looked through his empty house.

The rays of light beaming through the small window shot waves of shadows along the hardwood floor. His stare was as still as the shadows themselves.

"Geo, stop dozing off and hurry up," his mom said, honking the horn numerous times. "I'll leave without you if you don't come out!"

"Sorry mom," he yelled. Geo ran out, closing the door behind him. He felt the urge again to glance behind him, but just closed his eyes and ran forward.

"What was that all about?" his mom asked. "Do you always just stare blankly into empty space?"

"I'm just tired, that's all." Geo pushed his bag to the side and opened the window a little. "Just tired…"

"You should be going to sleep earlier. You can survive on 3hours of sleep because you're still young, but pretty soon, you'll be dying," his mom said sharply. "Think of how it'll affect your school performance."

"It's not like I'm failing," Geo retorted.

"It's not like you're getting all A's either, you should strive to be the best."

The car stopped at a traffic light. The sun reflected off the windows of nearby cars, sending glares in all directions. Geo closed the window and turned his head away from the light. The light turned green and the car accelerated ahead.

"You'll have to take the bus home today, I have meetings," said his mom. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a $5 bill. "This should be enough for the bus and your lunch."

Geo took the money and grabbed his bag. The car came to a slow stop in front of a large brick building. "Thanks for the ride," he said while opening the door. Geo stepped out into an empty patch of grass across from the front entrance. He could see many small groups of people discussing their issues or doing their homework. It was the usual atmosphere.

"Hey hey, guess what happened?!" someone said from behind Geo. Her dark brown hair was neatly pulled back into a large braid, which matched her colorful wardrobe choice for the day.

"Hey Lola," said Geo. He raised his hand a bit and gave a soft wave. "What happened?"

Lola took his arm and walked towards the school door, dragging Geo along. "Ok like so you know how my dad is a cop?" She paused to push open the door. "So like you know about all those weird untraceable deaths that went on two weeks ago?"

"Oh god, those stories were creepy," Geo replied. He pulled his arm from her grasp and stopped to the side of the main hallway. "But they stopped, so we should be fine."

"Well ok Geo I don't wanna freak you out," Lola said with a grin. "It might be too much for you." She pulled out her phone and replied to a few texts. "But I'll tell you if you wanna know."

"Dude just tell me, you're going to say it anyways, why go through all that dialogue?" Geo said impatiently. "Unless, you don't feel like saying it anymore."

They both laughed and leaned back against the wall.

"Ok so like last night, I overheard a conversation my dad was having over the phone with one of his partners. It turns out that the mysterious deaths haven't stopped, and it's not only our state that's had them, it's been happening from coast to coast!" Lola grabbed Geo's shoulders and looked him straight in the eyes. "Do you know what this means?!?!?"

Geo gave a blank look and shrugged, "I'm not… quite sure where you're going with this Lola."

"It means that we're still not safe, it could happen at any moment!" Lola suddenly jumped up and raised her hands into the air. "Do you not understand the seriousness of this situation!?!"

Geo looked around and saw a lot of eyes suddenly looking in their direction. "Uhmm Lola… could you like tone it down a little. You're doing one of your supper spaz-outs too early in the morning…"

"Ooops sorry Geo," she said with a smile. "C'mon let's go to our lockers."

The science wing was empty, nobody came here in the morning, except for the unfortunate students with lockers down there.

"But Lola, they still don't know anything about those deaths, just that they are all very brutal," Geo said confidently.

"But you still can't rule out serial killer, and plenty of people like to go after young students," Lola said dramatically. "We could all die any second now!!!"

"I think you're over-thinking this way too much. How could a serial killer be targeting people all across the country?"

"It could be a cult full of warriors who do ceremonial killing!"

"Good job Lola, you're finally putting logic into your statements. Cult warriors is definitely a possibility."

"Why thank you Geo, I'm smart aren't I?" Lola said jokingly. She stopped in front of her locker and spun in the combination. "I'm still a bit freaked out though…"

"Hey Lola, you didn't tell anyone else about this yet have you?" Geo said nervously. He closed the locker door for Lola and then pulled her into an unlocked science room.

"Not yet…"

"Lola, don't tell me you were planning on telling everyone?" Geo said with an annoyed tone.

"Well they should know about it!"

"Lola, why do you think the news has stopped reporting them, why the police had prevented the media from knowing about the continuation of the deaths?"

"I-I dunno Geo, I hadn't thought about it."

"There's obviously a reason, and if you tell everyone, you might be unintentionally involving yourself with something bad…" Geo crossed his arms and stared at her.

"I think you're over-reacting. Nothing bad will come from this." Lola stepped into the doorway. "I'll see you later."

"Lola wait, just don't- " The words stopped coming from Geo's mouth. His body was overwhelmed by a wave of chills. He bent over and held his stomach, staring down at the floor.

"Not again," he thought to himself. Right below his face was his shadow, slowly twisting as he swayed. "I have to, calm down… god I wish I had eaten breakfast." Geo turned his head and saw Lola staring at him. "I have to keep it down… until she leaves."

"Geo what's wrong?" Lola asked. She slowly approached Geo.

"NO!" Geo yelled. "You have to leave now…"

"Why?" Lola asked with a worried expression.

"I uhhh… have to throw up, and I can't make it to the bathroom. Can you go get me a bucket or paper towels or something?"

"Don't worry Geo, you can count on me!" Lola dashed down the hallway.

Geo stood up slowly, still looking down at the floor. He took deep breaths, trying to relax himself, but he could feel the tension building up in his core. "I can't keep it under control," he said in a weak voice.

His eyes were focused on his shadow, which was now exploding like a wild flame. Geo looked around the room and saw an anatomy model propped up against the wall.

"I hope this works," Geo thought. He closed his eyes and concentrated on the figure across the room, making sure that nothing else was disrupting his thoughts. Then he let go of his stomach and stood up, giving a sharp glare towards the manikin.

The quivering shadow shot across the room, flying past and absorbing every shadow in its path, growing to five times its original size. The black wave stopped at the shadow of the lifeless doll and Geo stood up straight, with his arms crossed.

"I've caught it," Geo said in a relieved voice. Geo took deep breaths and watched as his shadow slowly reclined into its normal position by his feet. He stepped back and pretended to look sick, anticipating for Lola's return. Geo checked his cell phone for the time.

"Seven minutes until first period." He stepped out into the science wing. Lola was nowhere to be found. He pulled out his phone again and called her.

Geo held his phone up to his ear and waited for his call to go through.

"Hey Geo, what's up?" Lola said.

"Uhmm… where did you run off to?" Geo asked.

"Oh I went to find a bucket for you, but I got distracted and uhhh spent 5minutes talking to Lindsay. And then I thought that you would've already thrown up all over the floor, so I decided not to go back… incase you were uhmm, a bit mad?"

"Thanks Lola, you're really a reliable friend…" Geo said sarcastically.

"Well you gave me such a complicated task, what'd you expect?"

"How challenging is finding a bucket, or paper towels, or a mop?"

"Ok sorry Geo, I'll make it up to you. How does uhmm, extra fries at lunch sound?"

"Buy me a slice of apple pie and I'll consider forgiving you," Geo said playfully.

"So do you love me again?"

"Yeah…"

"Ok well since we're all good again, I'm gonna be nice and tell you that class is starting in 3minutes, see ya in French, kay byes!!"

Lola hung up and Geo stood with a confused look. "Stupid Lola…"

Geo picked up his bag and started walking quickly to the foreign language wing. Lucky for him, it was all the way on the other side of the school. On his way there, he passed many upperclassmen with first period off. All of them looked so relaxed, chatting about irrelevant things…

"Ok, the bell hasn't rung yet, if I run I can make it!" Geo said to himself.

Geo ran full speed ahead. He didn't care that he looked awkward dashing down the hallway, everyone in his French class knew that if you're late, you get detention.

"Almost there!"

He held his bag tightly in one hand, grabbed the door handle, and pushed. Behind him, he could hear the steps of his other classmates who were just getting in.

"Geo, hold the door!" one of them yelled.

The bell rang just as Geo was stepping in. He walked in to find everyone standing around desks, chatting away. He looked over at the teacher's desk and saw an elderly man sitting where his French teacher should be.

"We have a sub!" Lola said happily. "Isn't that great? No Mrs. Fuss for a whole week or more! Don't you just love jury duty?"

Geo grabbed Lola's arm and sighed. "You could've mentioned that we had a sub when you told me I had 3minutes to get to class…"

"Oh right, that hadn't occurred to me until after I hung up… sorry" Lola put on an awkward smile and pulled Geo into a circle of chatting students.

"Honestly Lola, you're such a hassle… It's so hard to be friends with you."

"Oooh what'd she do?" asked someone in the circle.

"Are you guys going out?" someone else asked.

"No we're not, and secondly, she made me run all the way from the science wing so I wouldn't be late for class…"

"Haha good job Lola."

"Well excuse me… I don't recall it being my responsibility to make sure you're punctual for everything," Lola said smugly.

Everyone laughed.

"Ok, everyone sign this attendance sheet," the sub said. He stood up and held out a stack of papers. "Your teacher left you a few worksheets to do today, she expects you all to work alone, and silently. She wants me to collect these at the end of class, she will be recording these as a homework grade."

The old man's raspy voice was not something everyone wanted to hear at 7:35 in the morning. All the students groaned and waited for the worksheets to be passed out.

Geo looked at the ground, and watched as everyone's shadows sat still on the ground, like a painting. Geo felt as though the faint black lines were drawing him to them.

"Please pass the stack of papers back," said the sub. He placed a stack of worksheets on Geo's desk and waited. "Hello, wake up son…"

Geo snapped out of his daze. "Oh I'm sorry, I'm uhmm a bit tired."

"Ok whatever…"

Geo took the papers and passed back the pile. Lola, who was sitting next to him, had already finished the first worksheet, and was now madly texting everyone on her contact list. He looked down at his desk and picked up his pencil.

"True or false worksheet…" Geo thought to himself. "This will be simple."

The rest of the worksheets were passed out, and some people worked diligently until the bell. Most people, like Lola, spent the whole time talking and texting. Although, the sub didn't seem to care. It seemed the sub spent the whole class watching a DVD on his laptop.

The bell rang, and everyone dashed out for homeroom. The sub went around and collected the worksheets on the desk. Most of which were still blank.

"These kids… they're all slackers," he said menacingly.

Lola was waiting for Geo outside the French room.

"God that class was boring… but it's awesome to have such a laidback class first period," Lola said happily.

"You do know that not completing the worksheets will bring down your grade. You just lost your 100 in French." Geo said mockingly.

"That's where you're wrong Geo… I always get the extra credit on tests and I always do the extra credit projects. I probably had a 104, so the most I could go down from not doing a dumb class assignment is to a 103.6 at most. That still rounds up to a 104!!"

"Ok fine Lola… you're just wasting your somewhat smartness."

"Uhmm somewhat smartness? I'm a freakin' beast at school yo," Lola said while bursting out in laughter.

Geo and Lola were the last ones to show up to homeroom. The teacher took a head count and then left to get coffee.

"Geo, Lola!! I didn't see you this morning. Where were you guys?" asked a tall girl with dark black hair.

"Blue!!! Oh my gosh… you dyed your hair black," Lola said with shock.

"Whoa what happened to you Berry?" Geo asked. "It makes you look really Asian for a white girl."

"Geo you meany," said Berry. "I did not dye my hair just to look more Asian… although that's one of the reasons," Berry said with a smile. "I just thought I needed a new look, that's all."

"Don't worry Blue, I love it." Lola ran up and gave Berry a hug.

The teacher walked back into the room and silenced the class. She had a stack of green papers in her left arm.

"Ok class, our homeroom was chosen this week to go to the Maze-Scavenger Hunt funded by out local zoo. These are the information slips for the trip, there is no cost because the zoo is paying for it, but you guys need to remember to wear comfortable shoes, and dress for outdoor activity."

The teacher passed around the stack of papers and the bell rang again, ending homeroom.

"Yes! Geo and Blue, you're gonna be in my group right?" Lola said, holding onto both of their arms.

"I guess so…" Geo said awkwardly. He folded up the green slip and placed it into his binder.

"What about you Blue? It'll be no fun without you! Please?" said Lola.

"Don't worry Lola, I could never leave you alone in a maze with Geo. He might do something perverted," Berry said jokingly.

"Yes, I was totally planning on feeling her up inside the maze…"

The three friends laughed and split up to their different classes. Geo waved goodbye and dashed on to his next class.

"Don't you just love Geo?" Lola asked Berry.

"He makes everything… interesting I guess…" Berry replied.

"I don't know… sometimes he just gets on my nerves because he doesn't take anything seriously ya know?"

"Yeah I sorta get what you mean," Berry said reluctantly. "I don't know though. As someone who's known him since like forever, he doesn't seem to be the type who says anything that might cause conflict. It makes it hard to understand him."

"Blue… you're thinking way too hard. I just meant that it always seems like he's joking," Lola said with a weird look.

"Oh right," said Berry. She could feel her face getting hot. "I don't know.. I could be wrong."

"Whatevs."

Geo thanked the driver and walked down the steps of the bus. There was a line of people waiting to board, all seeming to be in a hurry. The man at the front was busy doing who knows what on his small BlackBerry, as were many other people behind him. Around the corner from the bus stop was a small coffee shop, which was always filled with people at all times of the day.

He felt his phone vibrate in his pocket.

if ur not busy, meet me at the mall i need moral support

-Lolapop 3

"What's up with her again…" Geo stopped two houses from his own and responded.

How can I help ya?

/Geoism

He stood still expecting Lola to give him an immediate response. However, she did not message back.

"Whatever," he said reluctantly. He went up to unlock the front door. Surprisingly, the door was already unlocked. Geo took off his shoes as he stepped into the kitchen. There was nobody home. Geo glanced at the two other backpacks by the closet door, his brothers had already stopped by and were now probably out somewhere having fun.

"This is too… unsettling," he thought. Geo stepped to the side and pressed his back against the wall. The slow ticking of the clock was clawing at Geo's mind with each second.

Suddenly, a small thumping noise leaked through the walls.

"Are those… footsteps?" Geo closed his eyes and let his shadow extend a bit. "Uhhh are you guys home, it's Geo." His shadow swerved and spread into tiny strands, scattering through out the floor.

"I'll know if there's a human shadow in the house," Geo thought reassuringly, although it didn't do much to calm his nerves. "Why am I so paranoid, I can protect myself can't I?"

He closed his eyes and felt the energy flowing through his shadow. Human shadows resonate differently than inanimate objects and animals.

"Nothing downstairs." His shadow receded and spiraled as it changed direction. It slowly inched its way up the stairs.

It made it halfway to the top when the phone suddenly rang. Geo jumped and grabbed the umbrella by his side, half-expecting someone to jump out with a knife. His shadow had dispersed in reaction to Geo's fear.

Once he realized what had happened, he walked over to the phone and answered.

"Hello, it's Geo."

"Oh, Geo. We left our house key at home, can you drop it by Ralph's house?"

"So that's why the door was unlocked," Geo accidentally said out loud.

"Ooops, sorry Geo," replied his brother, hanging up right away.

"What a hassle…" He looked at the clock.

The inside of Geo's room was brightly lit from the sun outside. The white walls reflected all the light back into Geo's eyes. He threw his jacket down onto the bed and sat down at his computer. Geo opened up a word document and dated the top left corner.

Shadows: Day 21

It's been three days since my shadow since lost control. I hadn't used my powers ever since that day when I over used my shadow and it went out of control. The image in my mind is still so clear. It shot out towards the shadow of a kid riding his bike and absorbed it. The boy was unconscious for about 15minutes even after I drew my shadow back in. I didn't want that to happen again, but it seems like my shadow will lose control if I don't let it frequently stretch its arms.

It seems that can control my shadow pretty well. I can move it in any direction I want, and it seems to be getting easier.

The abilities don't seem to be affecting my basic motor skills that much. Although I swear that I have better night-vision now, but that's yet to be tested. It might be more emotionally taxing, I feel like I'm a lot more paranoid and cautious about everything, and it's so weird…

My physical strength has not increased, and there seems to be no signs of more abilities. As much as I was hoping for something awesome like fire spitting, shadow manipulation is still pretty awesome.

I'm able to control the bodies of other people by absorbing their shadows. One draw back that I previously had was that the object I controlled did whatever I did. I figured out yesterday that I can anchor my shadow to an object with a big shadow so that I can keep something immobilized while I can move around freely. I can only anchor a shadow down for about 1.5minutes though. I can also sense when other people are near by the resonation of their shadows. It's too bad I can't change people's minds using their shadows, life would be so much simpler.

It's been three weeks since I first discovered my ability. I've been searching and searching but there's no explanation for how this could've happened. No solar/lunar eclipse, no chemical exposure, to high level radiation exposure, nothing weird in the stars… I'm completely stumped. There hasn't been anything big in the science community that would cause this sort of mutation, or whatever it is. There hasn't been anything in the media either. Nothing to explain why they just suddenly popped up. I haven't been going through any physical changes with my body that would cause something like this to occur. Unless everyone gains some sort of weird ability when going through puberty... I've considered the idea that it's biological, but if it's not, it'll be hard on me if people find out. I'm pretty sure my parents will definitely not be able to handle this.

I haven't met anyone else with an ability, not to my knowledge at least. They're probably like me, and hiding their power. My best bet would be to look for teens like myself, it'd make the most sense. An adult body doesn't seem like it could handle this much awesomeness.

I hope I can uncover more secrets…

~Ability Log: GEO

Geo saved the file into a folder hidden within a folder within a folder. The file folder was then dragged into the recycling bin, where he was sure nobody would find it.

"Ok time to head out."

He left on his bike to go pick up his brothers. It was about a 10minute ride down quiet streets lit by dimly shining street lights. The sun had almost set all the way, and there were shadows poking everywhere.

"This is my domain," Geo thought. He stopped at a big yellow house and laid his bike on the side, next to his brother's bikes. Inside the house, he could hear yelling and laughter, stomping feet, and the clicking up control buttons. Geo knocked on the door.

"Someone's here!" yelled one of his brothers.

"Who is it!? Who is it!?!" they all yelled in unison. Ralph's mom opened the door and smiled.

"Ralph, I think it's time they've gone home," she said gently.

"Awww man, bye guys," Ralph said in an annoyed tone.

"No it's ok Ralph," one of his brothers said.

"While you were getting drinks, we called our mom. She said she'll be working late and wants to know if we can all stay for dinner."

"That's fine with me," Ralph's mom said.

"SWEET!"

"Would you like to stay Geo?" she asked softly.

"No no, I already made plans. Plus I'd feel out of place with these brats…" Geo said with a warm smile.

Ralph's mom giggled. "Ok I see how it is." She closed the door halfway and poked her head out to watch Geo leave. "Have fun, and have a safe ride to wherever you're going."

Geo picked up his bike and rode home. He threw the bike onto the front lawn and dragged his feet across the kitchen.

"There's nothing good to eat," Geo said, while looking through the fridge. He could feel his stomach painfully asking for food, but his shadow just kept quivering, sending chills all throughout his body.

"Are you… warning me?" he asked. Geo stood still in the almost darkness (the light from the fridge… duh). He shut the door and walked up to his room.

He jumped on the bed and didn't move. The cold air coming through the window was casting an icy spell on his skin. Geo pulled the blanket over himself and closed his eyes.

Geo slept soundly for an hour or two until her heard banging on the doors.

"Geo it's us, let us in!"

He bolted up and looked out the window. Outside was an idle car, probably Ralph's mother's car.

"What took so long?" his brothers asked.

"Sorry, I was asleep…" Geo rubbed his eyes and turned on the lights. He looked at the stove timer/clock. It said 9:45 with a moon blinking on the side.

"Mom's still not home?"

Geo suddenly grew alert. "That's weird, she really isn't home yet… she's never worked this late before," he thought. "Come to think of it, Dad isn't home either…"

"Whatever… c'mon lets meet Ralph online!"

"Hey kids, it's time for sleep, not time to play computer games," Geo said sternly. "Wow, when did I have this much authority?" he thought.

"Awww Geo you suck, but whatever… I am a bit tired. Follow me!!"

The two ran upstairs to their rooms and got ready for bed. Geo grabbed his backpack, and did the same.

"Ok, before I go to sleep, I'll just finish up my homework." He took out his pencil and textbooks and began to hack away at his homework list. It took Geo an hour and a half to get through all the assignments that were due tomorrow. He set his alarm clock and checked what time it was.

"Whoa, 11:35… I hope mom and dad come home soon." Geo turned off the lights and set his head down on the pillow.

He closed his eyes for 15minutes until he heard the sound of a car driving by, the closing of car doors, followed by the front door opening.

"Oh good, they're asleep already," said their mom.

"I told you, Geo is responsible like that. And the house isn't a mess," replied the dad.

"You were the one who was worrying about having to deal with hyper children when you got home."

Geo crept down the stairs without making a sound. His parents were both smiling and setting their stuff down.

"Where were you guys?" Geo asked assertively.

Both his parents turned around.

"Shouldn't you be in bed?" his dad asked.

"Didn't go to sleep until about 15minutes ago because of homework. I came down when I heard the front door open."

"Sorry Geo, I was working late, when your dad called and said that old friends of ours wanted to take us out to dinner. To catch up on what's been going on," his mom tried to explain. "I was still at the office, so I didn't have time to explain or come home to change."

"You handled things well though, didn't have any problems at all."

"I've been home alone before," said Geo. "It wasn't that big of a deal."

"So did you stay at Ralph's house for dinner," his mom said while opening the fridge.

Geo suddenly remembered how he hadn't eaten anything yet, and felt his stomach gnawing at itself.

"Oh yeah, Ralph's mom is a great cook, it was delicious." Geo felt his body getting tense, and beads of sweat starting to form.

"Does he look different to you, seem different?" his mom asked his dad.

"Not really… seems the same to me," his dad replied.

"I'll be uhh going to bed now. Good night guys." Geo dashed up to his room and closed the door behind him. He jumped into bed and attempted to go to sleep. But he was distracted by the wavering of the shadows around him. His parents shadows were resonating intensely, almost like a flame. Geo could feel the anger that was built up, which troubled him.

"Ok whatever… maze tomorrow, gonna have a fun day with Lola and Berry." He closed his eyes and was deep in sleep moments later.

"Groups 1 through 10 get on bus 1, I repeat, 1 through 10." The teacher put down her bullhorn and raised her clip board, checking off numbers as each group got onto the bus.

"Looks like we'll be on bus two," Lola said. She grabbed Geo and Berry's hand and dragged them over to bus two. "C'mon slow pokes, this is exciting isn't it?"

Geo rolled his eyes at Lola. "Is she seriously this excited about this field trip…?" Berry who had seen his weird expression was giggling quietly.

"What happened? I wanna know… tell me!!" Lola said annoyingly.

"It's nothing," Berry said with a smile.

"Groups 11-15 get on bus 2, 11-15!"

"Oh my god… we practically get the WHOLE bus to ourselves!" Lola giggled wildly and pulled her two friends along into a seat on the bus. They all squished together with Geo being by the window, Lola being in the middle, and Berry at the aisle.

"Berry, you're good at riddles right. You can hold the map," said Lola.

"Sure thing…" she replied.

"And and Geo can do all the hard labor and whatnot!"

"What? Why me?" Geo complained.

"Because you're the guy, and that's usually what guys do… duh," Lola mocked.

"What if I don't wanna be the guy?" he said jokingly. Berry broke out in laughter, she covered her mouth just to hide her hysterical smile.

"Whatever…" Lola put her head on Geo's shoulder and closed her eyes. Geo, being him, felt really awkward in that position.

Berry looked over and mouthed the words "good luck with that". She turned her body and looked out the window to the left.

"Hey Geo, what's wrong?" Lola asked softly. "You seem different. Actually you've been different for a few weeks now…"

"What do you mean?"

"Well I mean you're so paranoid now, and you don't make as many jokes. At first I thought it was because you thought I was annoying and didn't want to be my friend anymore. But after I got over my bout of conceitedness I figured it was something personal…"

Geo was completely surprised. He did not know that Lola could be this intuitive. Well he knew, but he never thought that she would actually try. "Well, I guess it's complicated… and something you really don't need to know now."

"Is it that bad that you can't even tell your two closest friends," Berry said abruptly.

"I guess you can say that… It's something I can't tell anyone. So you don't need to feel bad. Even my family doesn't know, and even if you do know… it's a lot more complicated than it seems." Geo turned his head to the window and tried to ignore them. He could feel the weight of the stare pushing down on his shoulders.

The rest of the bus ride was awkward, but as the bus pulled into the maze lobby, Lola decided to break the ice.

"C'mon guys. Are we gonna win this or what?" She stood up and gave out a loud "Woohoo" then sat down to collect her friends from the seats.

"We'll try to win," Berry said awkwardly.

"We'll definitely win!" Geo looked up and Lola and gave her a reassuring look.

The group of friends met with all the other students in front of the buses. The teacher was standing next to one of the zoo guides, who was now explaining the rules of the maze.

"Ok kids, although the name of the activity is Maze Scavenger Hunt, the maze isn't until you reach the end of the scavenger hunt. It's lots of fun, and trust me on this, it's actually a lot harder to make it through than you think. The maze will be one group at a time, first group to finish the scavenger hunt will be first into the maze. The following groups will then have to wait," the guide explained.

"Now kids, please behave well. Susan will now pass out the maps and riddle sheets. You can begin once you get them," said the teacher. "And you can send one person from your group up to get your scavenging equipment. You will get all you need to be able to capture the things on your list," she said in a sly voice.

"Ok guys ya ready?" Geo attempted to say enthusiastically. The expressions on his friends' faces were blank.

"Don't worry, I'm the master of riddles," Berry said cheerfully.

"And I'm the master of winning!" Lola added.

"Then let's get going." Geo smiled and they all linked their arms and ran into the forest/jungle area.

"Eww, I hope there aren't a lot of bugs here," Berry complained.

"Oh my god I hate bugs too…" said Lola. She pulled down her sleeves which had bunched up to her elbows and continued to walk.

"I absolutely do not like bugs," said Geo. Berry and Lola looked at him funny and went ahead, leaving Geo a few steps behind.

"He's so funny," Berry whispered.

"Yeah…" Lola replied. They kept speaking in their hushed, secretive voices until Geo spoke up.

"I think the first thing on the list is a fruit fly…"

"Eww gross!" said Berry and Lola. They put their hands on their hip with the "Are you serious" expression across their faces.

"I'm positive that it's a fruit fly," Geo repeated.

"That would explain this weird jar," said Berry, holding up a small glass container.

"I vote Geo to be the bug catcher!" Lola yelled.

"I agree with that," Berry said with a smile.

Geo felt his heart speed up. He looked around and saw many creepy things flying through the air, and turned back to face his friends. "Do I really have to?"

"Yep, you're outvoted."

"What!?!?! That's not fair." Berry tossed the jar over to Geo, and continued talking to Lola.

"Ughh I hate them," he thought. He walked around and found a pile of rotten fruit with a sign "Do not touch" stuck near it. It was obvious that the park had placed it there purposely to attract fruit flies for kids to get.

Geo took 10 steps back and felt his skin begin to crawl. "This would be a perfect chance to let my shadow out," Geo thought.

He looked around and saw other students in their groups discussing the riddles.

"I'll have to make it unnoticeable," he thought. The shadow by his feet twitched and stretched out to the width of a rope. He carefully weaved it through the towering trees to make the shadow look more natural. Once the shadow got within range of the fruit pile, it split into hundreds of smaller shadow threads and shot into the mob.

Every singly fly stopped buzzing, they all fell to the ground and ceased to move. Surrounding trees provided a large cluster of shadows to form to the left of Geo. He lifted one foot and let his shadow leak into the cluster, and absorb it. Once it had absorbed enough, he lifted his other leg to let the rest of the shadow merge.

"This is a big cluster, I bet it could hold for 5minutes," Geo thought. Once the shadows were securely anchored to the tree shadows, Geo took the container from his pocket and removed the lid.

The students around him did not even seem to notice him there, they had probably already gone by and captured their fruit flies while Lola and Berry were standing their talking.

"This will be a piece of cake," he thought. Geo took the jar and brought it to the ground. He took the lid and flipped the fly into the jar. It twitched a bit when it landed , but once the shadow had reconnected, it was immobile again.

"Sweet, this will be a wicked easy." He got up and ran back to Lola and Berry as fast as he could. His shadow reconnected to him as he dashed by, and the flies began to move again once Geo had gotten back to his group.

"Sweet, you got the fly!" Lola said happily.

"We're gonna win this for sure, "said Berry.

"What's next on the list?" asked Geo. He was out of breath from his sprint back, and was now slouched over, attempting to catch his breath.

"Well we already collected 5things while you were gone, a rose petal, a blade of lemongrass, some sort of bark from a dead tree, a toucan feather, and pink sand."

"Where'd you find all that stuff so quickly?" Geo asked with a confused look.

"They just took all the stuff you needed to find, and randomly scattered it around the forest/jungle," said Lola.

"Well that's at least what happened with the toucan feather."

"The sand we got from some guide guy who was on his way back from the beach, it was stuck to his legs."

"He thought we were weird for wanting to clean sand off his legs…" Berry said in a shameful tone. But her poker face broke immediately when Geo raised one of his eyebrows.

"Interesting," said Geo.

"Ok well let's get going guys! We don't have forever."

They left and continued forward. Berry started to solve all the riddles, and Geo and Lola were looking around for the items on the list. It took them about 2 hours to find everything.

By the time they got to the maze entrance, there was already 6 groups waiting in line.

"Are you serious?!" said Lola. She stomped her left foot on the ground and moaned. "This will take forever…"

Berry poked Lola's arm and whispered into her ear. "I uhh need you to go to the bathroom with me… because I'm all out of… ya know, _woman's products_."

Lola's expression changed. "What the hell is a woman's product?"

Berry bit her lip and pushed Lola. She turned her back to Geo and stared at Lola.

"Ohh, you mean tampons…" Lola said ignorantly.

"What did you say?" Geo said curiously.

"NOTHING!" Berry yelled. She took Lola's hand and dragged her back towards the main area.

"Where are you guys going?" he asked.

"Bathroom I guess," said Lola.

Geo ran to catch up with them. "Oh ok, I gotta go too."

Berry tightened her grip on Lola's arm and increased her walking speed.

"Ohh slow down Blue… it hurts" Lola kicked Berry. "Besides, I don't have anymore tampons on me…"

Berry stopped for a second and released Lola's arm. Then she kept walking ahead, leaving them both behind.

"Oh… so that's what this is all about." Geo walked up to Berry's side and attempted to comfort her.

"I know me being a guy makes things like this awkward, but it's ok, I somewhat understand."

"It's ok Geo, I know that I can trust you and whatnot. I'm just really shy when it comes to things like this…" Berry put her arms around Geo and rested her head on his shoulder. "But don't worry, I wont hold this against you."

"What are you talking about?"

"Talking to me about stuff like this, touching me like that… It's practically sexual harassment," said Berry, while trying to suppress laughter.

"Oh I see how it is…" Geo let go of Berry and smiled. "Oh by the way, even though this might be awkward… here," said Geo, while pulling out a small white package.

"A tampon… you carry a tampon around with you?" Berry suddenly realized what was actually happening. Her face turned bright red, and she ran away into the girls bathroom.

**(LOL APRIL FOOLS GEO :D YOU WOMANIZER LOLS TAMPONS XD)**

Lola and Berry were in the bathroom doing who knows what. Geo was just sitting on the bench by the women's restroom entrance.

"April fools," he thought. "I wonder if she figured out that it was my chap stick..."

-In the Bathroom-

"What the hell, this isn't a tampon." Berry's voice echoed through the stalls.

"IT'S HIS CHAPSTICK!" Lola yelled.

"Gahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh fuck you Geo." All the women in the bathroom turned to see what all the commotion was.

"I hate him I hate him I hate him," Berry repeated.

Suddenly, Berry and Lola saw an old wrinkly hand under the door.

"You need a pad?"

-Outside Again-

There were many glares at Geo from women coming out of the bathroom. Each one seemed to be saying "What is this perverted boy doing here…"

"This is suddenly really uncomfortable," Geo thought. He got up and walked back to the forest area. There was now a sign in the front saying "Closed".

He glanced around to see if there were any witnesses, and ran into the forest. He walked down to the river and sat down on a tall rock.

"This is really… relaxing," he thought. He closed his eyes and let his shadow wander around. The only other shadows that he felt were the familiar tree and insect shadows.

Suddenly, Geo heard voices from far away. He jumped down from the rock and ran in the direction of the voices.

"Try again, again. It needs to be exact!"

"I know I know… I'm trying my best." A loud boom then could be heard, followed by the ground shaking a bit. Geo stepped behind a tall tree and hid himself in a veil of shadows. Slowly, he crept up to see what was happening.

Up ahead were two teens, a guy and a girl maybe 15 or 16 years old. The guy was a tall well built blond with a tight t-shirt and khakis on. The girl had dark brown hair with a darker, tan skin. Her hair was clipped to the side, with the tight ringlets hanging over her shoulder.

"You did great Mita," the guy said.

"Thanks Scott," she replied.

The ground was covered with deep depressions with shards of ice and balls of snow scattered everywhere.

"Just let me clean this up real quick," said Scott. He held up his hand and a yellow light glowed from his palm. The trees around responded by glowing too, and the air suddenly felt really hot.

"What's going on…" Geo thought. The ice and snow melted away, leaving wet, muddy dirt.

Scott kept his hand up a bit longer, and soon the dirt dried up, and looked as though nothing had happened.

"I don't get how you can do that," said Mita. She grabbed Scotts arm and gave him a kiss. "But I love it."

"I told you many times, I just make the roots of the trees to release heat into the earth, which melts the ice. Then I use the same tree roots to absorb the water in the ground… if you trained harder, you could have better control of you power too" Scott pushed up the glasses on his nose. His face was all red and sweaty, and he seemed to be out of breath.

"Using you power does seem to take a lot out of you Scott," Mita said in a concerned voice.

"That's why we have to train… so we can become good enough to help save the world…"

Mita held out her hands and summoned bright blue fluff into them. She closed her eyes and blew the fluff into Scotts face. It turned to a light icy breeze that even Geo could feel. "This will help you cool off," she said.

"That's Mita, now let's get back to training."

Geo stepped out of the shadows and approached them from behind. "You guys… have powers too?" he asked in a quiet voice.

Scot froze, too afraid to see what was behind him. Mita grabbed his arm and stared at Geo.

"What should we do?" Mita asked.

"I dunno, but I doubt he can keep something like this quiet."

"No no guys you don't understand, I have a power too…" Geo tried to explain.

"Could we kill him?" Mita asked, completely ignoring Geo.

"What would we do with his body?"

"Gah these people are really intimidating," Geo thought. He released his shadow a bit just incase.

"We'll give him a chance…" said Scott.

"For what?" Mita replied. The two then began to go on and on about plans and what they could do to keep him quiet, until Geo finally got annoyed.

"EXCUES ME, I'M RIGHT HERE!" Geo yelled.

"We know…" Scott said. "We'll give you a choice, you can either swear to keep our abilities a secret, or we will kill you right now." Scott waved his hand, and vines popped out of the ground on all sides.

"If you would let me explain," said Geo.

"Explain how you want to use us to help you make money? Don't want to hear it…"said Mita. She prepared a ball of winds in her hands.

"Enough…" said Geo. He released his shadow and took over their shadow. Scott and Mita froze, slowly moving their bodies into the same position as Geo's.

"Did you tranquilize us?" Mita asked nervously.

"No I didn't," said Geo. He raised his left arm to scratch his head. The other two did the same.

"What the hell," said Scott.

"As I was trying to explain, I have a power just like you. I can control people's shadows, and by controlling shadows, I can control their body. And I can do some other things that I don't feel like explaining." He drew his shadow back to his side and sat down.

"I have some questions I'd like to ask, you owe me that much for all the trouble you gave me," said Geo.

"We're sorry," said Scott.

"Yes, very sorry. Ask away!" said Mita.

"What are your abilities?"

Scott waved his hand and made many flowers pop up by Geo's foot. "I can control plants as you can see. I can control how fast they grow, what they grow… I can make an orange tree grow peaches. It's the most fun thing to do ever," he said while giggling.

Mita smiled back and then looked at Geo. "I can summon the cold," she said confidently.

"What does that mean," Geo asked curiously.

"I can create icy winds, balls of snow, pillars of ice, out of this blue fluff that comes out of my hands." She held out her hand and created some blue fluff. She closed her eyes and rolled it at Geo. It became a small snowball and then shattered by his feet.

"Wow, you guys have such cool powers. All I can do to manipulate shadows."

"Your power is very very cool," Scott said.

"Being able to control people's bodies, how fun and useful," said Mita.

Geo smiled and asked his next question. "When did you guys get your powers?"

"We both got them about a little more than a month ago," said Scott. "Well I did at least."

"I got my powers a week or so after Scott did," said Mita.

"I got my powers about three weeks ago…" said Geo. "Don't you think it's weird that we all got our abilities at around the same time?"

"That is very weird," said Scott.

"It rules out the possibility of genetically inheritance," said Mita.

"How did you first discover your abilities?"

"I was watching Scott practice his ability, I have really bad allergies, so I was sneezing a lot. Scott noticed that whenever I sneezed, something in front of me froze a little," said Mita.

"Then I explained to her how to conjure her ability. My ability is controlled by my thoughts of nurturing, so I told her to think of what she was feeling at the time she was sneezing."

"I told him that I was feeling annoyed," Mita said with a smile. "So then I thought of agitation while concentrating on coldness and it just happened."

"My story is a lot more boring," he said while laughing. "I was just watering my mom's plants when I noticed how they rapidly started to grow."

"I see," said Geo. He thought long and hard about his next question. "What are you guys training for?"

Scott and Mita suddenly became serious. They looked at each other as if they were telepathically discussing something, until Scott nodded.

"We'll tell you, since you might be able to help us," said Scott. "We're going to try to save the world."

Geo gave them both a funny look. "They must be like 10 years old to believe they could do something like that," he thought.

"You probably think that we are acting like children, having a goal such as this," said Mita.

"Whoa how'd she know what I was thinking…" he thought.

"Well it's a lot more complicated than that," she said. "Scott can explain it to you."

Scott stood up and crossed his arms. He closed his eyes and began to tell his story.

Although it seems that our powers are amazing and wonderful,

it's not really as good as it may look. It seems that with the arrival

of these amazing abilities, their has been an up-rise of evil,

I guess you can say. Not everyone who gets abilities can seem

to handle it. And those who can't handle it mutate and become

savage, uncontrollable monsters, or just cease to function and

die slowly and painfully. Mita and I have seen other people with

abilities who were unable to handle the power, and as a result

they turned into horrible monsters. We want to save the world

from the fate of dealing with them. You know those mysterious

unsolved deaths on the news right? The mutating people are the

blame for all those deaths, which can explain the widespread deaths.

It can also explain why they are unsolved, since all the people who

mutate will die between a few hours or a few days.

Geo stood speechless, staring at Scott as though he had just said something unbelievable.

"So you're saying that I might mutate and die?" Geo asked.

"It's a possibility, but it's very unlikely among people who have control over their abilities like us," he responded. "I don't know that scientific stuff, but I'm sure if you can control your ability very well, your body will be able to handle it."

Geo signed in relief. He looked over at Mita who seemed to be distracted by Geo's twitching shadow. She looked up and realized that Geo had seen her staring.

"Does it have a mind of its own?" she asked.

"That's a good question," Geo said confidently. "I'm not quite sure about that yet. All I know is that if I don't let it absorb shadows, it'll go out of control and attempt to absorb every surrounding shadow."

"That's quite terrifying," said Mita.

"So people can mutate after getting abilities?" Geo asked again.

"We think that people can mutate even before getting abilities," said Mita.

"What ever has caused this, it reaps society like a double edged sword. Although it is doing more harm than good…" Scott clenched his fist and leaned against a tree that he created. "That's why we're trying hard to save everyone, because if nobody does anything, it'll get out of hand."

"That is why we want you to join us," said Mita. She and Scott both stood up and reached their hand down to Geo. "Train with us, and save the world with us."

Geo had no idea how to react. All he knew was that he reached out his hand to them and they pulled him to his feet. And not soon after, he had his shadow released, ready for action.

"We need to help Mita gain control over her power," said Scott. "She sometimes over-blows it, or it completely disappears before it hits the ground. Especially the snow and ice balls."

Mita raised her arms and created blue fluff she threw it into the air and a giant snowball suddenly appeared. Then she summoned a burst of icy wind to completely freeze the snow as it hit the ground hard.

"Amazing," said Geo.

"Thanks," said Mita. She went up to try it again.

Suddenly, Geo's phone vibrated.

"Oh crap I totally forgot about Lola and Berry," said Geo. He picked up and pressed the accept button. "Hello?"  
"Geo where are you?" It was Berry. She sounded somewhat worried.

"I uhh wasn't feeling well so I went back to the bus to lie down."

"SEE I TOLD YOU." It was Lola's piercing voice.

"The maze is gonna start soon, hurry back."

"I'll just stay here, I don't think I'll make it," said Geo.

"We'll come to you then."

"NO go without me, I'd feel guilty if you missed it."

"You sure?" asked Berry.

"Positive."

"Ok, bye Geo!"

Another ball of snow hit the ground, and Mita stood up proudly.

"I think I've finally gotten control over this darn ability," she said. She pulled off her sweatshirt and tossed it to the ground by Scott's jacket. For someone who controlled ice, she was sure sweating a lot.

"Mita I think you should take a break, you look really over worked," said Scott.

"Nah, I'm fine, I feel like I could like make a snowstorm!"

"Whoa Mita, pace yourself."

She already had a huge amount of blue fluff in her hands, and she was ready to toss it up. "Don't worry, I can do it."

There was a sharp cracking noise, it sounded like a surge of electricity. Mita suddenly grabbed her chest and fell to the ground.

"Mita!" yelled Scott. He ran up and grabbed her hand. "It looks like you've worked a little too hard?"

Geo looked at Mita, he had a bad feeling in his gut. "Her shadow seems to be resonating unusually high," he said.

Mita sat up and coughed. She attempted to say something, but all that came out was blood.

"Mita, we have to get you to the hospital, don't worry."

"Scott don't be an idiot," she struggled to say. "We both know what's happening…" Mita pushed Scott away and walked away from the other two.

"I don't get it, you were doing so well… This isn't fair at all," he yelled. "I can save you, I know it."

"What's happening?" asked Geo.

"I'm… degenerating," Mita said softly.

Geo could feel it. Her shadow was resonating wildly, even his own shadow almost felt overwhelmed. "So this is a person who mutates?" he thought.

Scott grabbed Mita's hand and tried to get her to go with him. "I can protect you, I can save you…" he kept repeating.

Geo watched from not far away, until he suddenly felt Mita's shadow stop resonating. "This can't be good," he thought.

Scott was suddenly shot 20 feet back, the whole front of his shirt was covered in frost. Geo looked at Scott, and then Mita. Her hair had started to become disheveled and her eyes did not seem human anymore.

"People who degenerate… lose their ability to comprehend their surroundings. They attack everyone no matter what, that's why they're so dangerous. It doesn't matter if it's a friend or foe… it doesn't matter," said Scott.

"What can we do?" asked Geo.

"We can't let her get out of this forest," said Scott. He raised numerous vines out of the ground, prepared to strike. "We'll have to try our best to keep her here until she calms down. Then we try to save her."

A shower of ice spears flew from overhead. Scott extended the branches on the surrounding trees to deflect them all.

"Our best bet is for you to immobilize her and then I'll try to talk her out of her rampant state."

Geo released his shadow and attempted to connect to Mita's. She was anticipating this very move, and jumped up and ran from the shadow. While in the air, she managed to summon three huge ice boulders, which Scott barely deflected.

"HURRY!" said Scott.

Geo spread out his shadow and absorbed all the shadows of the trees. His own shadow grew about 10times its normal size and lunged at Mita. She tried to counter it with a blast of ice wind, but it just went right through the shadow, striking Geo instead.

"Oww…" said Geo. He could feel a numbing sensation throughout his arm, but his shadow connected to Mita's and she was now unable to move.

Scott walked up, with the vines not trailing far behind him. He went up to Mita and took her hand.

"Mita, remember what we said about self control?" said Scott. "You're doing a really sucky job at it right now."

Mita just stared at him coldly, and managed to keep summoning winds even without using her hands.

Geo felt like he was in the middle of winter, his whole body was shivering, but he struggled to keep the bind on Mita.

"Crap… I can't anchor down her shadow because I've absorbed all the shadows that were close to me," Geo thought. "I'll just have to endure…"

"Mita stop this, you know that I'm gonna have to hurt you right?" said Scott. "You can't be the monster. Don't you remember our goal."

Geo could feel Mita's shadow struggling desperately to break free. His whole body was already weakening from the cold, keep up his hold on her shadow would prove to be more difficult that Geo had anticipated.

"Scott, you have to hurry up, I can't hold her for long."

"Mita, listen to me you can fight it! I know you can…"

Mita still kept her icy glare. Scott looked as though she had just pierced his heart. He fell to the ground and looked depressed. The plants around him all seemed to grow restless, suddenly glowing with yellow light.

"Scott… are you trying to subdue her or seduce her?" Geo said impatiently. "Honestly, this is getting us nowhere."

"This really pisses me off… it's an ironic dose of karma?" Scott looked up at Mita. "I'm confused about where to go next, maybe I'll start to degenerate like this too."

Mita's expression changed. She almost looked sorrowful, but it didn't last long. She released a gust of wind, hitting Geo directly.

Geo could feel his grip loosening, his mind was losing focus. "I can't last much longer," he thought.

"I hate how I finally got something good in my life and now it's going to be gone…" said Scott. "Don't you agree Geo?"

"Oh my god… hurry up Scott," Geo tried to yell. His voice faded before he could finish. He could sense all his surroundings growing fuzzy, and darkening. The last thing he saw was a large vine pulling Mita down to the ground, and an ice shower flying right in his direction.

Geo woke up on the bus, his head really hurt, and his nose was running really badly. He sat up and felt a note taped to his chest.

To Geo:

I probably wont ever see you again, thanks again for helping with Mita. However I'm not quite sure if I can save her yet? I've decided to give up my fantasy of saving humanity from collapsing, since I obviously have no place in the resolution of this problem. You on the other hand seem to have much potential, and with the right help, could play a key part in resolving this whole fiasco. I don't know, maybe you'll even be the great hero. I have one last bit of advice to give you, or information I should say. Mita knew more about this than me, but we have an idea of what is causing all these issues. It has something to do with electromagnetic waves, but the rest of the answers that we seek are hidden somewhere in Japan. You probably will not be able to accomplish anything now, but in time I'm sure you'll step into the right opportunity.

Scott Guire

Geo folded the note and put it in his jacket pocket. "What a drama queen…" thought Geo. "What do they expect me to do?"

He sat for 5minutes until he saw the other students approaching the bus. Lola and Berry were walking together, but when they saw Geo's face they ran past everyone and jumped into the bus.

"GEO!!" Lola yelled. "We were so worried."

"You feel better after resting?" asked Berry.

"No, I feel extremely suckish… very very suckish."

"Aww that's too bad," said Lola.

"Was the maze fun?" asked Geo.

"Meh, it would've been better if you had come along," said Berry. She took her seat next to Geo and rested her head on his shoulder. "I really was worried about you…"

"I'm fine though," he replied. He was confused on what was happening since he obviously missed the point that Lola and Berry were trying to bring across.

"What Blue is trying to say is… we know that you've been different lately. We don't know why, and it's ok if you don't tell us…" said Lola. "But just know that we're there for you if you need anything, and we sort of like the you that's changed a bit."

"You do?" Geo asked, now he was really confused. He thought he had become more paranoid and uncool.

"You seem more… serious now, someone whom we could depend on," said Berry. "And we were discussing how we really like having you as a friend."

"We really really like it!" Lola added.

"So you like me more because I'm paranoid, uncool, always saying weird things, and not as funny? Where are you guys going with this?" Geo said jokingly.

"We love you Geo," Lola said cheerfully. They both leaned over and gave him a kiss on the cheek. Geo blushed and tried to think of something cool to say, but another thought came to his mind.

"Thanks guys, I like being close to you too…"

**I hope you enjoyed the newest chapter to anime wars staring YOU! I hope that I didn't disappoint you with this, I know that I'm not the best writer in the world, but I feel that I put all my heart into writing the best chapter that you can get! Once again, Happy birthday :D (You're getting old… APRIL FOOLS!) srsly you're getting super old…**


	5. Chapter 7: Double Edged Heart

Anime Wars

Chapter 7

Double Edged Heart

_A memory_

"Push me higher!"

"Are you sure?"

"Yes Tony I'm sure!" she said with laughter. The bruises and cuts on her legs hinted that she had been playing outside the past few days.

"Ok, here we go!" A small boy with long dark hair rolled up his sleeves. He stepped back and watched the swing go up and down a few times until he got ready. He ran up and pressed his hands against her back, applying a strong upward force to her lower spine. Tony watched as she soared high into the sky, running back to avoid being plowed by the backswing.

"Did you see that, did you see??? My feet touched the branches, I went so high!"

Tony wiped the sweat from his forehead and leaned against the swing set, looking around for people passing by.

"When did your mom say you had to go home?" Tony asked, grabbing the chain to bring her to a halt.

"She didn't say, just to have fun and be safe…" She jumped off and wiped her hands on her dress. Her shiny black hair began falling from the tight bun it was put in, flying everywhere as a sharp wind came.

"It's already uhmm… almost 6 I think," staring at his watch. "My mom says as long as I'm not by myself I don't need to be back until 8."

"Are you sure it's just 6? It seems too dark to be 6…"

"Here you check," Tony said, reach his hand out to her. His blue penguin watch ticked softly as it counted off each second.

"Tony you dummy, this says 9:25," she said, suddenly squeezing Tony's arm. Her bored smile suddenly changed to a quivering lip. "I… I've never been gone from home for so long."

"Sylvia, I don't get what you mean." Tony took both of her hands and looked at her sad face. "It'll be alright, as long as we're not alone. Everything is scarier when you're alone."

"No Tony you don't understand," Sylvia said, suddenly pulling away. Her arms flew back as she fell to the ground. She sat there in a ball, crying still.

"What's wrong Sylvia? Maybe you can tell me." Tony knelt down next to her and put his hand on her head, trying to comfort her.

"Well… my mom said that I wasn't allowed to go and play because I didn't practice piano for the past week," Sylvia said blankly.

"Oh no, Sylvia… does that mean you left without telling her?"

"No, I told my mom I was leaving… leaving and never coming back home." She stood up and kicked Tony's shoulder, tearing up again when he fell on his back. "You're lucky your mom is nice."

"Sylvia, you can't just run away just because you don't want to do something… it'll just give you more problems when you decide to go back." Tony took Sylvia's hand and started pulling her to the direction of her house.

"It's not like she cares anymore."

"What's that supposed to mean?" asked Tony. His hand was still tightly grasping Sylvia's, trying to get her to move.

"Well it means that the first time I ran away, she got really worried, and even the second and third time too; but the fourth and fifth, now the sixth time. She doesn't even look to see where I'm running off to."

"Sylvia you dummy, if you kept coming back home of course your mom would stop worrying," Tony said reassuringly.

"No Tony, you're the dummy. Any good parent would be worried that maybe this time their daughter might not come back." Sylvia wiped the tears from her eyes and stomped her feet several times. "She's the worse mother in the whole world!"

"Sylvia, you always seem to be making so many problems for her. Maybe you should be more considerate to her. You're always so nice to me, why can't you be nice to your mom too?"

The sun had now fully gone down. Sylvia obviously did not want to reason with anyone.

"I bet she doesn't even look at me anymore," Sylvia said coldly. "Whenever we eat dinner, she's always reading the newspaper, or watching TV."

"Does that mean she doesn't care about you?"

"My mom is so nice to you whenever you come over, making snacks for both of us, offering a ride back home… no wonder you're on her side."

"Sylvia, that's not fair. I didn't ask for those things…" Tony was worried now. He had never had a serious argument with Sylvia before and wasn't sure how this would end.

"All the adults think you're so adorable…"

"Everyone always calls Sylvia cute and pretty when they see her."

"Whatever Tony." She slapped his hand and gave him an evil glare. "You're obviously good enough for both of us; maybe it'd be better if I'd just die…"

_End_

"Hurry up Sylvia, I left the car running." Tony took off his thick sweatshirt and slipped a brown cardigan over his t-shirt. He buttoned two buttons in the middle and then stepped up to the mirror to check how he looked.

"You look like a fag," said someone from behind him.

"Dammit Sylvia, you take forever… I'll have to drive fast to get to school on time." Tony ran towards the door, picking up his schoolbag on the way out.

He got in the car and buckled his seatbelt. The passenger seat was laced with layers of crumbs and grease. Tony used his hand to brush off as much as he could, but gave up soon when he saw Sylvia step out the front door.

"If you don't want to be late, pick me up 20 minutes earlier tomorrow," said Sylvia. "But I like it when you drive fast, you're always so paranoid… it's kinda hott."

Tony rolled his eyes and pulled out of her driveway. "You're a disgrace to Asians, your mom must be so proud of you." Tony suddenly wanted to take back his words. "Shouldn't have mentioned her family…" he thought. He knew it was a touchy subject, but Sylvia just sighed and turned away.

"Holy shit Tony look out!" Sylvia suddenly grabbed Tony's arm, and she looked back as a blue van sped by. "That's like the second time this week that you've done that. Don't you check before you back out of driveways… what if that was a person?" Sylvia complained.

"Dude I think it's the same freakin' van every time… it's like it waits for me to get in the car, and then drives behind me when I try to back out."

"Yeah yeah, you and you're excuses," Sylvia opened the window and threw some wrappers out.

Tony made a face and continued to back out. "But seriously, it has to be the same guy. How many people drive an ugly blue van like that?"

"You've got a point there, but you know, my neighbor probably leaves for work the same time we leave for school? I don't know, it's not important."

Luckily, the daily school commute was just before rush hour, and there would be minimal traffic. They pulled up to a red light and stopped. Tony glanced over at Sylvia to see what took her so long.

"What the heck…?" said Tony.

"You don't like it?" Sylvia said mockingly.

"No, it's the opposite. You actually look… somewhat decent today," he replied.

It was true. Instead of her usual sloppy, gothic outfit, she had on a tight, tan blazer with a teal camisole underneath, along with a pair of slim, boot-cut jeans. Her hair, which was usually tied back in a tight bun, was loose and pinned back in some places.

"What's the occasion?" asked Tony.

"Just thought I'd change things up… all that black was giving me a headache."

Tony drove on, laughing at the comments made at Sylvia's previous style aesthetic.

"Seven minutes."

"Huh?" Tony turned to see what all the commotion was. The car slowed down a bit, but continued going smoothly down the road.

"Yo, keep looking straight retard… you want us to die?" Sylvia slapped Tony's arm with all her strength. "And I was saying, seven minutes until we're late Mr. We-Gotta-Always-Be-On-Time…"

"If you don't want us to crash then don't hit my arm," Tony replied smugly. He shot a witty glare at Sylvia, one that said "Heh I win".

"Whatevs…"

Tony pulled into the senior parking lot and chose a spot right in the middle, under the blazing sun. He signed and picked up his stuff.

"We get the crappy spots for coming in so late…" said Tony. He started walking towards the entrance, not looking back at his companion.

"Meh, if you drove faster it wouldn't have been a problem," said Sylvia.

By now, Tony was now more than halfway to the building, while Sylvia was still standing on the passenger side of the car. "If you want to make it on time, I suggest you run!" Tony yelled. He slipped both straps of his bag onto his shoulder, and dashed to the door. "What a nice start to the day," he thought.

Tony felt so cheerful that he forget how much of an idiot he'd look like running into school at full speed.

"Whoa, I might have to pull you over for speeding…" said an obnoxious voice from behind. Tony kept walking.

"It's too late to do anything now," he thought.

"That's right, keep walking."

"Stupid immature sophomores… they're so annoying," Tony thought to himself. "Don't make me go over there and punch you out." He smiled and laughed (on the inside) and found his way to his locker.

"Hi Tony!"

A girl stepped out from behind a crowd of students. Her long, almost black, hair was up in a ponytail. A thin blue ribbon was tied loosely to the top of her head. She looked like she was dressed for some kind of party rather than sitting for seven hours in school.

"Do your arms still hurt from helping me rearrange my room?" she asked.

"Oh, I guess they're a bit sore. Not as bad as Monday thought." Tony slipped three books into his bag and shut his locker. She was now standing right next to him.

"Sorry again for making you perform slave labor," she said awkwardly. "I appreciate it."

"Nah it's ok. You're making it sound like it was a lot of work."

"Well you know… it would've been much harder if I moved it myself."

Tony paused to think of what to say next. He looked around to see if there was anyone coming who he could start a conversation over. "Hmm, nothing…" He scratched his head and yawned.

"Alright, I should get going to class," she finally said. She picked up her tote bag and started walking down the hallway.

"Natalia, wait!" said Tony. He ran up to her and started walking slowing ahead. She followed slowly behind.

"Yep?"

They continued walking, talking in hushed tones.

"How has… you know, that thing been doing?" Tony whispered.

"What'd you say? Can't hear you." Natalia pulled Tony aside and waited for him to repeat himself.

"Well… how has your skills improved?" Tony repeated, even quieter than before.

"Yo, you gotta speak up I can't hear you at all."

Tony bent over and brushed his lips against her left ear. "This loud enough for you?"

"This is good," she said, while hitting him in the back of the head.

"Well I was asking how your job at that preschool is," Tony finally said.

"Why didn't you just say so earlier," Natalia complained. Her slid her fingers through her ponytail and took Tony's arm. Taking small steps, Natalia proceeded to drag Tony straight ahead. "Well the kids like me more now. None of them avoid me or run away from me. They don't even cry when I try to play with them anymore!"

"I don't get how you can be so patient with those kids. I'd definitely lose my cool and probably yell at them to shut up," Tony said while forcing out a laugh.

"Well the key is to understand them. But mostly just to give them what they want. Most of the time, they usually want the same stuff as us."

"So a four-year-old wants to pass AP chemistry, get into a good college, and find a good girlfriend?" Tony replied.

Natalia rolled her eyes. "They want distractions, success, and happiness. It's just human nature. Everyone just wants to fit in and be loved."

"And a kid can understand society like that?" Tony turned and made eye contact, looking intensely as he waited for her answer.

Natalia squinted her eyes, as though she was focusing hard on something. Finally she took a deep breath and spoke. "You can't overlook children. They are naïve, but they are also informed and sophisticated in their own way."

Tony and Natalia sat down by the entrance, passing by a mob of students who had just gotten off the bus.

"I don't understand," Tony whined. He put his hands behind his head and sat back against the window.

Natalia crossed her legs and looked off into the distance. "You know that preschoolers have cell phones?"

"Damn spoiled brats…" Tony mumbled.

"It's sort of a safety thing, for paranoid parents."

"Well yeah, that would make sense."

Natalia could see Tony wasn't getting the bigger picture. "Do you know what parents say to their kids when they hand them a cell phone?" she asked.

"Err, don't press random buttons?"

She slapped Tony's arm. "No… they say 'Keep this incase of an emergency. You know who to call if you bump into a bad guy'. It's a bit disturbing; all of the adults are expecting the worst from everyone."

"Isn't it normal to say stuff like that to your children?" Tony asked, even more confused now.

"All the kids have what they're told ingrained into their minds. Each and everyone keeps their phone close, as if they're on the look out for something bad. One day they'll willingly walk into a situation of duress."

Natalia suddenly looked all gloomy. "There are no angels anymore…" she said in a somber voice. "Everyone single one of them is corrupted."

Tony didn't know what to say. He had a frigid feeling and wanted to crawl under a rock and disappear. Finally he manage to spit out a few words. "Natalia," he whispered. "What happened?"

Natalia looked up and saw Sylvia, staring grimly at her and Tony. She smiled and got up. "I'll take you to school one day," she said cheerfully. "Gotta run to class, I'll talk to you later kays?"

Natalia started to run away.

"Wait!" Tony yelled. "Stay away from fried foods!"

He turned around and grabbed Sylvia's arm. "We're going now," he said sternly.

Sylvia followed along for about 2 minutes until she finally laughed and pulled Tony aside.

"What was that all about?" Sylvia asked. She ran her fingers through her hair.

"It's nothing really; I was just asking her about her job at the preschool."

Sylvia gave shot a dirty look at Tony. "Seemed like more than that from where I was standing," she said in her "skeptical" voice.

"Preschool is stressful!" Tony said mockingly. "It's a challenge to hand out milk and cookies." Tony had a wide grin on his face. He put his hand on Sylvia's shoulder and laughed.

"You seem to be around Natalia a lot lately." Sylvia finally said.

"She had a bit of a panic attack a few weeks ago, and I sorta helped her through it I guess. She's been talking to me ever since then." Tony scratched his head and put his hands in his pocket, trying to look like he was carefree.

"She's pretty too," Sylvia added. She stared at Tony through the corner of her eye.

The words went right through him. He showed no reaction at all. "Yeah she's pretty nice, surprised she hasn't had a boyfriend in a while though."

"Ohh… so she's single then?"

"Yep."

Tony seemed anxious, he could felt he awkward mood lingering over him and Sylvia.

"What took you so long outside?" he asked.

Sylvia pulled a dark purple flower out of her bag and placed it on Tony's lap. "It was really nice outside, thought I'd enjoy it a bit before classes."

Tony stared deeply at the flower, it was narrow like a daffodil, but also had long petals. "Pretty nice pick you got."

"Yeah I guess, but then I walked inside and saw you and Natty."

"What?"

Sylvia stood up and patted Tony on the head. "Let's just say, it ruined the surreal atmosphere."

Suddenly, a basketball flew into Sylvia's chest.

"Ahh crap. Who fucking threw the ball," Sylvia said, looking around for the perpetrator.

A tall guy with spiky hair came up and grabbed the ball. His face was clean, as though he had just shaved moments ago.

"My bad, I didn't mean for it to hit you," he said nonchalantly. He had a menacing stare, as though he were trying to provoke someone.

"Hey man I don't like the way you're talking to me… fuck off and just go and play ball with your buddies," Sylvia said crossly.

Tony stood up and looked down at Sylvia. "Why were you just standing there watching us?"

She took her pocket and flicked Tony on the forehead. "I was just injured and you have no concern about me whatsoever?"

"Ahh sorry, I didn't think it was that big of a deal?"

"I didn't want to come between you two, aren't I a nice friend?"

Tony felt tension building up in his head, there was suddenly a lot of pressure. "Nobody said you couldn't join the conversation, you're making it seem like I left you out."

"You're making it seem like it's my fault… you always create friction out of nothing and then blame it on me. It's freakin' annoying"

Tony stepped back and took a deep breath. "Ok whatever. I'm no good at dealing with these kinds of situations. I'm just gonna leave now."

Sylvia punched Tony in the chest and glared at him. "You can't deal with this because you always run away when you don't understand." Her face was red with anger. She pushed Tony aside and walked away.

"Sylvia!" Tony yelled.

She turned around and waited impatiently for what he had to say.

"Uhh err…" Tony didn't know what to say. "We're still going out for lunch later right? I'm buying Taco Bell."

"I'm not hungry…" She continued walking down the long hallway, not turning back again.

"Damn…" Tony thought. "That's not what I wanted to say."

_A memory_

_Sylvia's house, 6 years ago_

"Tony, can you pass me the three dolls by your feet?"

Tony picked them up and tossed them across the room to Sylvia. "Gonna add them to your donation box?" Tony asked

"Maybe." Sylvia stared at them for a while and placed one into a large cardboard box. "Pass me the scissors."

Tony slid a box of craft equipment on the floor, and Sylvia pulled out a pair of scissors.

"What do you need them for?"

Before Tony could finish, Sylvia began trimming away the hair of the dolls. She stared at the dolls with intense focus, until the two Barbies™ were a balding mess.

"What'd you do that for?" Tony yelled. "Who would want a messed up doll like that?"

Sylvia smiled and tossed one into the trash. "I'm not gonna donate them; who would want something that's so messed up?" Her smile slowly faded into an angry glare.

"Nobody wants anything this fucked up, nobody nobody nobody…" She picked up the doll, whose blond hair was now in pieces all over the floor. With one yank, the head was pulled off and tightly grasped in Sylvia's left hand.

"You lucky bitch, I ended your agony."

"Sylvia stop it! You just wasted toys that could've made some unfortunate kids very happy." Tony said. He ran up and took Sylvia's hands. "You gotta think about things before you act."

She sighed and turned towards her door. "You can throw all the clothes into the box too. It's not like I have any dolls to dress up anymore."

Tony smiled and watched Sylvia as she walked out. He put the clothes into the box and sat on Sylvia's bed, waiting for her to come back.

"What are those cookies for?" He could hear Sylvia's mom say.

"They're for me and Tony," Sylvia replied. Tony could hear the bag wrinkle as she fidgeted.

"Why don't you tell Tony to come down for some apple pie?"

Sylvia put the cookies down on the table. "I'm pretty sure he doesn't like apple pie."

"Oh that's a shame, ask him what pie he likes and I'll make it next time!"

Sylvia crossed her arms and stomped her foot really hard. "First of all, I'm sure Tony doesn't like pie in general, and second of all, he's my friend not yours. Just stay away from my friends."

Sylvia's mom put down the knife and rinsed her hands. She turned around and stared Sylvia down. "What friends, Tony is the only one of your classmates that cares about you."

Sylvia grabbed the cookies and cleared her throat. "He's probably the only person that cares about me." She ran up the stairs and into her room. Closing the door behind her.

Tony sat still on the bed, trying to look busy so that she didn't think he overheard the argument.

"That was a lot of trouble for some cookies eh?" Sylvia said, smiling widely. She ripped open the bag and dumped a pile onto a napkin.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to eavesdrop." Tony said nervously.

"It'sok Tony. I was talking pretty loud. I'd be shocked if you didn't overhear." Sylvia took a handful and tossed them in her mouth. Crumbs fell all over her shirt.

"You're such a pig Sylvia. I'm shocked you're cleaning out your room!" Tony followed up on Sylvia by tossing a handful into his mouth as well.

"Don't get used to it, things will get messy again. Just wait." Tony and Sylvia laughed, when suddenly Sylvia got very quiet. It was like she had just remembered something important.

"Sylvia, you have your idea face. What's your plan this time?"

She thumped Tony on the back of his head and giggled. "Well since you're my best friend…" she paused for a while. It was almost as though she forgot everything she was about to say. "So I saw on TV, this thing about an alternate reality, where everything goes the way you wanted."

"Sylvia, not again with your random stories…" Tony shrugged and continued to listen.

"It's a different dimension created by the mermaids, so the only way to get in is through the water."

"Sylvia stop with this nonsense… what your saying can't possibly be true. And you know it yourself." Tony pulled Sylvia down next to him and looked her in the eyes. "Don't get rambling about how you'll step into a better place where everyone is happy, and our lives would be better. It scares me." Tony put his head on Sylvia's shoulder and closed his eyes.

"You think I'll stop believing just because you ask me to?" Sylvia could feel herself tensing up in anger. But she didn't push Tony off.

"If I could spend the rest of my life, right here in this moment then I'd be happy. But I can't stay knowing there's somewhere else I have to be…" She pet Tony's head and closed her eyes, trying to savor the moment.

Tony was lost and confused. He had no idea what Sylvia was talking about, but all he knew was that she was happy.

"Sylvia… why can't you be happy with me here, I'll always be here." Tony squeezed her arm, believing that if he held on tight enough she would snap out of her delusional thoughts.

"You think that by crying, all your problems will be solved… it's almost pathetic." Sylvia finally got the strength to push her friend away, and take the first steps towards her future.

"Wait Sylvia, where are you going?!" Tony asked as he watched her jump out the window onto the roof.

Little by little, Sylvia maneuvered her way to the ground and ran down the street. Tony followed her out the window, chasing her as she got farther and farther away.

"Sylvia where are you going?"

"Heigal Pond, that's where my door is," she yelled.

After 10 minutes of running, Tony found himself and the old park, Sylvia and now Heigal pond in his line of sight.

"What can you do here so late at night?" Tony yelled ahead.

"The door to your destiny never closes."

Tony knew it was now too late to stop Sylvia with whatever she was going to do. He stepped onto the flat parking lot of the still pond. There was no wind disturbing the waves, and the surface of the pond below him sat almost still.

The dark, starry sky created a veil of mystery in the surrounding area. Tony almost started believing in what Sylvia had said.

She ran towards the forest, growing father and farther away from civilization.

Sylvia stopped at the bike bridge that led across the water to the other half of the forest. She turned and face Tony, as though she was waiting for him to come to her.

Tony took her invitation and moved towards her. The moment he started moving, Sylvia jetted across the bridge, stopping once again for Tony to catch up.

"Sylvia, this is ridiculous. What can you possibly do out here?"

"I know what I'm doing, you can join me if you want to." She stepped to the edge of the bridge, looking over at the calm waters. "If this reality was as peaceful as this water, maybe I wouldn't have to leave."

"I don't get what you're doing, if you're gonna drag me along, at least explain." Tony put his hands on Sylvia's shoulders and tried to make sense of what she was saying.

"You can come with me Tony, we'll be happy there together." Sylvia turned and put her hands on Tony's shoulders. "It would be great."

"Fine, I'll go with you to wherever. Just promise me everything will be fine when we get there."

"I can guarantee that." Sylvia smiled awkwardly and turned back around, facing the moon. "Just follow me."

"What exactly did you see on TV anyways?" Tony asked curiously, thinking everything was fine again.

"It was actually on the news," Sylvia replied. "So I know it's true"

"I watch the news, and I don't remember seeing anything like that. What was it?!" Tony asked again, now really eager for her answer.

Sylvia turned and smiled, almost as though she knew what Tony's face would look like when he heard the answer. "Man jumps off bridge going to a better place…"

Tony felt his heart suddenly drop. Sylvia was already over the edge of the bridge before he could finish saying "But that man died!"

Sylvia fell down 60 feet and hit the water with a loud splash. Tony looked over and saw ripples extending everywhere.

"SYLVIA!!!" he yelled. He waited for her to come back up to the surface, but after a minute, Tony ran to the shore and started heading out to find her.

A young man who was jogging in the forest at the time was not far behind Tony, and waded through the water looking for Sylvia.

"SYLVIA!!" Tony yelled again. "Oh god, what if she's dead," Tony thought. Tony couldn't move at all. All he could do was stand still and cry.

During his time of confusion, Tony had not noticed the team of policemen that had arrived, the ambulance, and the fire truck.

"Are you alright son, are you alright son?" the policemen kept repeating.

Tony still just stood there, not hearing a word they said. He was picked up and placed on the shore, trying to remember how it had come to this.

_End Memory_

On normal school days, Tony would wait by the door, and go home with Sylvia. On days when Sylvia was pissed at him, there were a few places that Tony would go; first of which is the art room on the second floor, her usual hiding place.

"Hello?" Tony said, as he knocked on the door to the art room. There was no sound coming from the room, which was Tony's signal to step in.

"I'm sorry about today." He sat down facing the door, with his back to the rest of the room. The table squeaked and jiggled as he adjusted his seat to a comfortable position. "I know that you only said what you said because of my actions. I know that I always run away when there are issues with people… I'm sorry."

Tony suddenly turned around when he heard the sound of something snapping. Up in the right hand corner of the room was Sylvia, organizing colored pencils. She placed down the two halves of a cyan pencil and swiped them off the table with her hand.

"That's a lie," Sylvia said boldly. Slowly, she resumed her actions.

"I don't get you, first I piss you off and you say some hurtful things to me, I agree to what you say, and you're still not happy?" Tony kept his eyes focused on the door. It made it easier for him to talk assertively.

"You know, it's sad…" Sylvia got up and sat on the table to the right of Tony. "You're probably the person in this world that understands me the most, and yet you don't understand anything at all."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It makes hard to imagine what other people think of me, what they think I feel."

"So you're just acting out for attention? Is that how everything is for you?"

"I COULD CARE LESS ABOUT OTHER PEOPLE'S ATTENTION!" Sylvia yelled. "I don't need those sympathetic showing me how misunderstood I am."

Tony pointed his finger at Sylvia without turning around. "So you're saying your life is just one huge paradox? And my social skills are just nowhere good enough to help anyone?"

"Tony you idiot…" Sylvia bit her lip as the first bits of tears were beginning to fall onto her cheeks.

Tony got up and hugged Sylvia. Somehow he felt that if he held her long enough, everything would be fine again. He rested his chin on Sylvia's shoulder, and breathed softly into her ear.

"So can you tell me that this is all my fault, and that it's all just one big misunderstanding made by me?" Tony whispered.

"Not this time buddy."

Sylvia had once again put him into that dark place where he felt completely clueless, powerless, and confused.

"Then how am I supposed to help you?" Tony asked.

"You can't."

He felt his arms loosen up and fall to the table; his whole body was beginning to feel numb with confusion.

"You know I can't take that answer, I have to help you no matter what," said Tony. "That's just the way I am."

Sylvia turned away and flicked her hair in Tony's face. "And you're pretty damn good at helping people, but not that good."

"I don't get what you mean."

"How did you help Natalia with her problems?"

Tony stepped back and scratched his head. "I guess she just needed someone to talk to and hold her hand when things got tough?" Tony honestly had no idea what he did. "I'm not entirely sure."

"Why don't you hold my hand and talk to me?" said Sylvia.

"I do that with you."

Sylvia stood up and slapped Tony on the face. "I'll tell you what you do to help me… you stand back, and watch me suffer, then tell me everything is fine afterwards. You run off somewhere when you're confused, and then later say you're sorry and comfort me. You sit there and watch me cry, as if it's amusing to you, and then attempt to distract me. You leave me when you know that I'm dying on the inside…"

"That's not true," Tony yelled.

"And yet with Natalia, my mom, and all those other frreakin' people, you become some compassionate saint that heals every single thing every single time."

Tony sat still and reflected on what Sylvia had just told him. "That can't be true…" he thought. Then he thought back to that night on the bridge. The memory of that night made Tony clench his fist. "I was the one that could've stopped her, but all I did was tell her that I'll be there when she's done suffering…"

"The truth hurts doesn't it?" Sylvia whispered. "You've been useless to me as a friend, and you always will be. No matter how hard you want to change, you can't do anything at all for me, except hand me the gun to shoot myself with."

"I've had enough of you Sylvia; I honestly do not know why I've stuck with you for so long!" Tony yelled. "I'll just do what I usually do and run away as you suffer alone, because you won't take my help."

"Then get going."

With the final words of their argument fading into the back of his head, Tony escaped from the art room, and dashed out the front door. Most of the students had gone home by now, except for the ones at sports practices. Out in the parking lot, he could still see six cars, one of which Natalia was getting in to.

"HEY!" Tony yelled from the front of the lot. "Wait a second!"

Natalia looked up and smiled. "What's the rush?"

Tony had to stop and think for a second. "What am I actually doing?" he thought.

"That was a joke Tony… It was a err different way of asking 'why are you running?'" Natalia covered her mouth while she laughed at Tony. "But it's cute how you actually thought about your reply."

"Don't make fun of me," Tony said playfully. "And yeah, I'm not really in the mood for jokes… if you know what I mean." Tony put his hands in his pockets and sat up against the hood of his car, facing Natalia.

"Ahh, so something did happen between you and Sylvia… hope I didn't have anything to do with it." Natalia took a seat next to Tony, and put her hand on his back to comfort him.

"You can tell what kind of problem I have just by looking?" Tony said innocently. He suddenly realized what he had just said and felt awkward. "Well I mean… my problems and like the err stuff."

"Yes, that's exactly what you meant to say."

The two couldn't help but having large goofy grins, but it didn't help lighten Tony's mood that much.

Natalia suddenly felt it was the right time to move the conversation forward. "So what exactly did happen?"

Tony stared off somewhere into the distance as though he was trying to recall an important memory. Something that would help him makes sense of what was happening.

"It wasn't really anything big; I just realized how useless I am as a friend…"

"Wait, I'm confused," Natalia replied. "I cannot think of anyway how you are useless as a friend. You're probably the most helpful person I've met."

The words made Tony cringe; everything Sylvia had told him was now rising to the surface. "That's exactly right."

Natalia gave Tony a hard slap. "If you know you're not useless, then don't stay upset. Sulking over such trivial things isn't like you; it doesn't suit you at all."

Tony got up and stood with his hand on his car door. "I'm sorry Natalia," he said while unlocking his car. "There's no way I'd expect you to understand this. Thanks for cheering me up though." Tony opened the door and threw his bag into the passenger seat.

"You don't look very cheerful," said Natalia. She grabbed Tony's arm to stop him from getting in the car.

"You're just too stubborn Natalia… just let good-enough satisfy you for today." Tony shook her loose and waved goodbye.

"Nobody can be satisfied when they know they can do better," she said sharply. "I know what you can do, you can help people in ways that I probably will never understand."

"That's called being over-confident." Tony started the car and rolled down his window. "Which seems to be the case right now."

"I'm only being so persistent because you're not even trying!" Natalia started to walk away. "You're not even trying… just avoiding what you can't comprehend."

"Funny… someone told me the exact same thing earlier," he said as his window started going up.

"That person knew what they were talking about!" Natalia shouted.

Tony turned on the radio and sat in his car. He looked at his phone ten times, and almost called Sylvia seven times.

"This is retarded… I should be able to help her," Tony yelled. He closed his eyes and waited for an answer to come to him.

Tony's sweaty skin stuck to the leather seats of his car, making a gross peeling noise as he lifted his arm. He felt his whole body got really hot, followed by an itchiness on the left side of his body.

"This is really pissing me off," Tony said as he scratched his arm. He suddenly felt soreness and pain coming from where he was scratching.

"What the hell…" All up of Tony's left arm appeared deep cut marks. Some were wet with blood, while others were already scabbed over.

"This is just great, another complication in my life…"

_A month and a half ago_

"Haha, you have a chem. project!" Sylvia teased. "That's what you get for applying yourself in school."

"I need to pass chem. if I want to stand a chance of getting into a good school," Tony complained. "You're lucky to not have to worry about it."

"Just start working after graduation like me. That is, if I make it to graduation."

Tony laughed. "The end of this school year isn't that far away, but I wouldn't let my guard down just yet."

"Who's your partner this time?" Sylvia asked.

"Oh, you're gonna get a kick from this… Natalia Lillet." Tony stood up, expecting Sylvia to fall over from laughter.

"Oh damn… that girl is so awkward, even I find her pathetic." Sylvia was on her back, laughing as hard as she could.

"I know what you mean… I swear the only things I think I've seen her wear is a hoodie and jeans. It sort of bothers me."

"Hey, I think that's a smart choice of hers," she said while taking out a lollipop. "It eliminates the issue of deciding what to wear. That's takes off a lot of stress ya know." She placed the purple sucker into her mouth and began molesting it with her tongue.

"Sylvia, stop giving me dirty looks like sucking your lollipop like that… I think that's going a bit too far even for friends." Tony hung his head in false shame, and got exactly what he expected.

A textbook slammed into the back of Tony's head, and laughter followed behind it.

"Nonsense… when you're pervs like us, it's perfectly fine." Sylvia must've gotten tired of her candy because she tossed the lollipop twenty feet across the room.

"Well I suppose I should get going," said Tony. "I told Natalia I'd meet her at her house today in twenty minutes."

"Oh, so you're the one who decided to do dirty things, and in her room too!" Sylvia pulled a small package from her pocket and tossed it at Tony. "Don't forget this, better safe then sorry."

Tony flicked the small square back at Sylvia. "Keep your condoms, you'll need them where you're going."

Sylvia did the jaw-drop "What the hell did you just say" look, which made Tony give his most earnest smile.

"Just don't do anything dumb… without me."

Tony got up and waved goodbye to Sylvia. He headed to his car and took out his phone.

"Oh, she doesn't live that far from school… I guess I'll be early then," Tony said to himself. He started the car and headed down the one way, taking a left down into a large street.

"Number 166, found it!" Tony pulled into a large driveway and parked next to three tall apple trees.

"Weird, trees shouldn't have fruit this time of the year…" The front door was a dark green color, with a shiny gold handle. Tony rang the doorbell and waited.

"Hold on hold on… don't doing anything without me," said a Man's voice. The door opened, and a tall muscular man with dark chestnut hair appeared. He had a mug of coffee in his left hand, and a porn magazine stuck under his armpit. The man smelled strongly of alcohol and smoke. His long black dress pants dragged on the floor as he approached, and his shirt was a blinding white, and wrinkle free. He looked like he had just gotten home from working all morning at a bar.

"Is that Natalia's dad?" Tony thought. "He looks like barely thirty-years-old."

"Who are you?" he said.

Tony was caught off guard, he didn't know what to say at first. "I err – I'm here to do a chem. project with Natalia," Tony said, stuttering at first.

"Oh, come in."

Tony took off his shoes and closed the door behind him, the man looked at him funny as he waited from him to come in all the way.

"I'm Natalia's brother, you can call me Ricky." He reached out to shake Tony's hand. "Natalia is up stairs in her room, probably reading or whatever. I haven't been up there in months so I wouldn't know."

"Ok thanks," said Tony.

Ricky turned around and placed his coffee onto a table stacked with newspapers. "I'll be down here watching the game if you need anything."

Tony went up three steps when he suddenly heard Ricky call his name.

"By the way… if you're gonna do anything, like do stuff with Natalia, remember to be quiet and close the door. I can pretty much hear everything from down here," said Ricky, in a mocking tone.

"Thanks for the tip," Tony said respectively. He ran up the rest of the way to avoid another awkward comment from Ricky.

At the end of the stairs was a long hallway stretching horizontally. Directly in front of the stairs was most likely a closet, and too the right was a room with bright pink walls, covered with posters of dogs and flowers.

"That must be Natalia's room?" Tony thought. He walked to the door and looked in. Everything looked neat and in place. Sitting with her back faced to the door was a skinny, dark-haired girl.

"Whoa I've never seen Natalia not wearing a sweatshirt…" Tony suddenly realized something else. She was not only without a hooded sweatshirt, but without a shirt in general, just sitting there in her bra.

"Oh damn, this is embarrassing," he thought as he tripped over his foot and fell backwards.

Natalia screamed and turned around in shock.

"SORRY!" Tony yelled. He could not avert his eyes fast enough, and saw something that disturbed him.

Before his butt hit the ground, he saw Natalia with a small razor in one hand, with numerous lacerations all over her arm. Tony quickly got up and shut the door behind him. He sat in front of her door waiting for about 5 minutes until Natalia finally came to get him.

"You can leave if you want," said Natalia. She peeked her head out the door to see if Tony was there.

"Oh no, it's fine," Tony said awkwardly. His face was red in embarrassment. "I was just caught off guard when I err saw you without a…a shirt."

"Oh right," Natalia said quietly. "I'm sorry about that. You were 17 minutes early, so I wasn't expecting you to come in." Natalia mumbled some other things, but then got silent when she realized Tony was actually paying attention to what she was saying.

"You err can leave now… we'll do the rest at school or whatever," said Natalia.

"We haven't even started yet."

"Oh right… I uhmm guess you can come in then?" Natalia opened the door all the way. She had a large blue sweatshirt on, along with a pair of loose fitting jeans.

"So we're supposed to do a presentation, so I was thinking power point so-- "

Natalia was nervously glancing at the clock ever few seconds. Her arms were crossed and she looked very uncomfortable.

"Something wrong?" Tony asked.

Natalia didn't say anything at first, she just sat still.

"I know you saw… you don't have to pretend like nothing happened," she said timidly.

Tony carefully chose his words to make the conversation less awkward. "I don't even remember that your bra had green dots… err well now I remember but I uhhh."

Natalia looked like she almost wanted to laugh at first, but then changed back to her bitter stare. "I'm talking about my cu—self inflicted wounds."

"Oh right," Tony replied nervously. "I was trying to avoid things you might not want to talk about."

Natalia rolled up her sleeves and looked at her cuts. "Thanks for considering my feelings… but really, you can leave now. I know how uncomfortable this is for you."

Tony wanted to say "Ok I'm outta here" but something stopped him from escaping.

"Anything I can do to help?" he asked bluntly. "Not that I'm any good with these kind of things."

"I don't think so, it's pretty complicated," Natalia replied.

Tony saw she really didn't want him here, but he felt the need to stay and help. "Maybe just talking about it will help. Sometimes talking it over helps someone clarify the things they're dealing with."

"You do NOT want to hear my story," Natalia said assertively.

"But I sorta wanted to see if I could help you…"

"You won't be able to!"

"Just let me try." Tony took Natalia by the wrist and stared at her cuts.

She turned her head away as if she was saying "Don't look at my arms, they're embarrassing".

"You must be the type of person that thinks they can fix everything, that must butt into EVERYTHING," Natalia said sorrowfully. "It's pissing me off."

"I just want to help," Tony whispered. He took one arm and ran his index finger along one of her long scabs.

"What made her do this to herself?" Tony thought.

"Owww," Natalia said quietly. She pulled her arms away and moved away from Tony.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you." Tony stood up and watched as Natalia tried to avoid his attention. He felt a warm sensation in his fingers, like they were being dipped into water.

Suddenly she screamed. "What's happening to my arms?" Slowly, each gash was fading away, leaving behind soft, bare skin.

Tony ran up and took a closer look.

"It's completely healed," he said.

Natalia looked at her other arm which was still covered in cuts.

"Let me see," Tony said, grabbing her other arm. He ran his index finger along another one of her scabs. The same thing happened to her other arm as well.

"I don't understand…" said Natalia. She ran her palm up and down her arms, expecting everything to suddenly make sense.

"I don't know…" Tony extending his arm, trying to place his hand on Natalia's shoulder.

"You need to leave now."

Tony didn't even hesitate. He jumped up and grabbed his bag. He ran down the stairs, right past Ricky and out the front door, stopping in the driveway. Tony threw his bag on the floor by his car and squatted down, hugging his legs.

"That was really weird," he thought to himself.

Tony distracted himself by putting his attention on the apple tree. It had plump, red apples all across this branches, also along the grass by the trunk. Tony got up and picked up an apple, rolling it around in his hand.

"At least I helped her," he thought. "But that's not important. How she suddenly healed is what I should be thinking about. Maybe it was just an illusion! That'd make sense."

"I hate this, as if I didn't already have enough to worry about!" Tony yelled.

He could feel his fingers growing hot again. "Something's about to happen?" he thought. Tony ran his index finger along the outside of the apple. The apple started heating up at first, and then gash marks appeared all over it.

"WHAT THE HELL?"

Tony jumped up and threw the apple across the street.

"What is happening…?"

"I would like to know too," said a voice from behind.

Natalia stepped out from behind his car and approached Tony. She took awkward steps, half limping with her right leg.

"I thought that… you might be an angel or something, but now I see I'm wrong." Natalia sat down on the hood of Tony's car, staring in the direction the apple was thrown.

"How do you know I'm not an angel?" Tony asked.

"Well I'm guessing angels can heal people… but they can't hurt things like you just did to the apple."

Tony looked at his hands, they looked perfectly normal to him. "I don't get what you're saying."

"By the looks of it, it seems as though you can take the wounds of someone, and give it to something else."

"So I'm like an accident sponge?" Tony said jokingly.

Natalia thought long and hard about her next statement. She nodded her head and finally said: "It's probably more like a thumb drive, you can pass things from one computer to another."

"Ohhh! I understand when you say it like that," Tony said, half smiling.

"I sorta knew you'd say that…"

_End Memory_

The throbbing in his left arm came in waves of severe and mild pain; bending his arm was out of the question.

"Crap, I think I might be opening up the cuts." Tony stiffened his posture and started his car. "Screw it," he mumbled.

Tony bit his lip and lifted his left arm, grasping the wheel tightly. He could begin to feel small streams of blood flowing down his forearm.

It only took a minute for Tony to adjust to driving in his condition. The car was able to smoothly pull into the driveway of his house.

The sun had already begun setting, and the darkening clouds were collecting over the town. Drops of rain were falling in random areas all over; it didn't take long for it to start pouring.

Tony got out of the car and let the rain beat on his head for a few seconds; it was slightly refreshing at first, until he felt the water begin to seep through his clothes.

"That's great," Tony mumbled. "I guess I'll just go change later." He pulled his hood up and looked at his arms. The deep gashes that used to be there were now numerous scars that stained his arms.

The living room was dark when Tony opened the door. In fact, the whole lower area of the house was unlit, which meant that only Tony's sister was home.

"What a pain," he thought. Tony put down his stuff by the front door and proceeded upstairs.

"Jocelyn did mom drop by before leaving today?"

Tony waited at the end of the stairway and waited for a reply.

"Hey Jocelyn, I asked you a question… did mom come home or not?"

It was still silent. Tony walked up to a brightly lit room and peeked around. It was empty.

"Hey, where are you?" Tony asked, as he stepped inside.

"Yahhh Tony you dummy," yelled Jocelyn. She ran up and hugged him tightly, dropping the tennis racquet by her feet. "What took you so long to come home? I was soooo scared," she complained.

"Jocelyn don't be such a baby, I find it relaxing to be home alone." Tony pat her head and walked back to his own room.

"That's cause Tony does perverted things when nobody is around," she mumbled.

"What did you just say!?" Tony yelled.

"Ughh whatever…" Jocelyn pushed Tony and closed the door in his face. "I'm busy so don't bother me."

Tony felt his muscles tighten. "That girls got some nerve," he thought.

The interior of his room had a stark feeling to it. There was almost nothing inside besides a bed, a small desk with his computer out it, and a TV with all his games and consoles next to it. The carpeted rug made a quiet brushing noise as Tony stepped inside.

"What a sucky day," Tony thought. He sat on his bed and stared at the clock against the wall.

He sat down on his bed and looked at his arms. The throbbing pain in his arms had disappeared a while ago, and the scars had already begun to lose their color.

"I thought this thing would've went away by now," Tony said while looking at his hands. They looked just like anyone else's hands. "This thing is giving me so many problems."

Tony took a deep breath, and reached over to his desk for a bag of corn chips. He placed a few in his mouth and closed his eyes. "I have no choice now," he thought. "I have to get rid of all the wounds I've collected."

The silence was giving Tony a headache. He could hear the quiet drumbeat of the song that was being blasted somewhere in the neighborhood. "I wonder if we're out of Advil," Tony mumbled.

Tony opened his eyes when he felt a burst of light shine into his eyes. The hall lights flickered on, and a grungy shadow approached his room.

"Honestly Tony, you always hide in the dark," said Jocelyn. She pushed his door open all the way and held out her cell phone to Tony. "Dad wants to know what you want for dinner."

Tony walked up and grabbed the phone from his sister. He held it up to his ear and spoke as clearly as he could.

"Hello?" he said while clearing his thought.

"Tony, is that you?" asked his dad.

"Yeah, Jocelyn said that you're buying dinner or something right?"

"Oh it's ok Tony, I already bought it."

Tony squinted as if he were having trouble understanding what he was just told, he couldn't help but smile. "Alright then, why do you want to talk to me?"

"I'm just worried about you Tony," his dad said in a serious tone. "Your mom says that you've been spending a lot of time away from home lately. She said that instead of hiding in your room, you wouldn't show up until right before I would get home. Care to explain what you've been up to?"

Tony felt a sudden increase in pressure in his head, he felt like he was being crushed. He felt his face getting hot, and his whole body getting sweaty. "Dad, it's nothing serious," said Tony. "I just started doing volunteer work at an animal shelter, that's all…"

He heard his dad sigh and then put down some papers on a table. "We'll talk about this when I get home."

Tony closed the phone and threw it onto his bed. He ran downstairs to the kitchen and pulled out a bottle out of a cabinet. "I think I've already helped too many people," he thought while swallowing three pills.

_One month ago_

"I know mom I'm on my way to work right now," Tony yelled into his phone. "Yes I dropped the car off for repair, I'm walking on Hoover Street right now."

Tony hung up and walked over to a nearby bench to rest after three hours of walking around.

"Today has been pretty productive," he thought. His hands were stuffed into his pocket to keep them warm, but he could feel them burning with energy.

Behind him was a large park that was almost empty except for two girls playing on the slides, and a guy pushing his girlfriend on the swing.

"How sad," Tony thought. "Nobody comes to this beautiful park anymore."

Tony watched as the girl flew higher and higher through the air. Her feet swayed wildly, as though she was running.

"Don't push me too high," he could hear her say.

The guy would just laugh and say, "Are you sure this is high enough for you?"

Tony sighed and slouched back into the bench. "They seem happy," he thought. He tried to remember the last time he saw Sylvia that happy.

"I wanna get off now," Tony heard the girl yell. He turned back once more saw her look back at her boyfriend. He pulled up his sleeves and threw his hat onto the mulch.

His medium length hair blew around in the wind, constantly flinging into his eyes. "Alright, are you ready?" he asked. The guy dug his boots into the ground and held out his arms like he was going to catch something large.

The swing flew back, and he grabbed he wrapped his arm around his girlfriend and the swing, bringing her to an abrupt stop.

The girl looked back and smiled, waiting for her boyfriend to let go.

He just kept laughing until their eyes met.

Tony didn't know what they were doing, but he sort of expected what was coming.

The girl said something that Tony couldn't hear, and then their heads moved together for a kiss.

A large gust of cold air ripped through the park, causing everyone's body to tense up.

The guy just tightened his grasp on the girl and kept his lips pressed against hers. (ONLY IN A SHOUJO MANGA WOULD YOU SEE SOMETHING LIKE THIS 333)

Tony looked away feeling embarrassed. He focused his attention to the girl who was sitting on a bench to the left of him. She had been crying with her face buried in her hands for the past seven minutes.

"I guess it's time to make a move," Tony thought. He grabbed something in his pocket, and approached the crying girl.

"Do you need a tissue?" he asked while holding out a wrinkled McDonald's napkin.

The girl turned her head and lifted up her hood to cover her face. She looked in Tony's direction and hesitated as she reached out for the napkin from him.

"Thanks, I guess it's about time I stop crying," she said weakly.

Tony sat next to her and took another napkin from his jacket. "It's ok if you still want to cry, there's nothing wrong with that." He looked up at two men in suits walk by, their expressions seemed to ask the same thing; "I wonder what happened here?"

"Maybe I should comfort her some more," Tony thought. He felt sweat start to form at his hairline as he put his hand on her shoulder.

"If something terrible happened to you, you should cry as much as you want," Tony said tenderly.

"Thanks," she said again.

Tony thought for a while about what to do next, he finally decided on introducing himself.

"My name's Tony, is there anything else I can do to help you?"

The girl looked over and buried her head into Tony's shoulder.

"I guess you just need a shoulder to cry on," he said humorously.

"Do you want to hear my story?" she finally said.

Tony looked away so that he wouldn't be talking into her hair. "Sure, you can tell me what happened."

"Well first of all, my name is Anna," she said quietly. "And I go to a private school that you probably don't know about."

"So you're in high school?" Tony asked.

"Yeah, eleventh grade, same with my boyfriend."

"Is that's what this is about, your boyfriend did something to upset you?"

She pushed Tony away and then turned in the opposite direction. "Last night, I spent the night at his house, and when I woke up this morning, it looked like he had just gotten back form doing something. I was curious so I said 'what were you up to?' and he turned and glared at me." She leaned on her side against the bench and continued her story.

"His eyes were so scary, it looked like he hadn't slept in days. I got up and then found him in the kitchen. He said 'I'm making us omelets dear' and had a pan heating up on the stove. That was when I got worried."

Tony was beginning to find her story more interesting and began to pay attention. "What made you worry? Did you not like his omelets?" asked Tony.

"My boyfriend doesn't cook, he doesn't know how to, and he'll never learn," Anna said nervously. "So I told him, 'it's unusual that I find you here in the kitchen' and I took out two plates for him. He suddenly got all weird, and started crushing eggs with a mallet on the cutting board. I said to him 'if you're just playing around, let me do it before you waste all the food'."

"Your boyfriend sounds really weird," said Tony. "If I were you I would've ran out of the house, even if I were still wearing my pajamas."

"That's what I felt like doing when he held up the mallet at me. I got worried so I took a knife from the table and pointed it at him. 'Stop it Rob, you're scaring me' I told him. But I didn't know what was wrong with him. He got freaked out and took the hot pan off the stove and hit my arm with it. I dropped the knife and tried to run, but he grabbed me."

"This story sounds scary," Tony said childishly. "I would be falling to pieces if I just went through all that."

Anna turned around at tapped Tony on the shoulder. He turned to face her as she pulled down her hood.

Tony felt awkward when he saw her face.

"Basically what happened was that he pushed my face into the stove, and then held me down until I went unconscious," she said while feeling her burnt skin.

"That sounds horrible," said Tony. He pulled out his phone and looked at the time.

"And now whenever I look into a mirror, I'll remember him and what happened," she mumbled.

"Can't you call the police or something?" exclaimed Tony. "They can definitely do something about it."

"I can't do anything at all, I knew from the beginning I'd be screwed over if I dated him."

"Why is that?" asked Tony.

Anna pulled up her hood again and shoved her hands into her pockets. "His mom is the chairman of my private school…" (Well who else are your evil boyfriend's parents supposed be, the mayor?)

Tony got up and pulled down her hood once again. He brushed the back of his hand against her cheek and smiled. "You're face doesn't look as bad as you think it does, hurry up and be happy again!"

He took out one last napkin and wrote his phone number into it. "I have to go to work now," said Tony. "But you can call me if you still need someone to talk to."

She looked up at his smiling face and then gave him a kiss on the cheek. "Thanks, I really appreciate you helping me."

"It's no problem," Tony said while stretching his arms. He waved good bye and then began walking the rest of the way through the park. When nobody was around him, Tony pulled out a piece of lined paper and quickly scribbled something on it.

"Broken bones, knife wounds, gun shots, and now severe burns…"

_End Memory_

"KYAHH TONY!! There's a sketchy van outside our house!!!" he heard Jocelyn yell.

Tony ran to the window and peered out into the front yard. He felt chills shoot up his back when he saw the ugly blue van. "So it has been following me this whole time," thought Tony.

"Jocelyn!" Tony yelled. "Stay inside, and don't look out the window. I'm gonna go see what those people want."

Tony put on a thick jacket and hard work boots and walked outside. The person inside the van seemed to have been waiting for him, since the driver's side suddenly clicked open.

"What do you want?" yelled Tony. "I'll do what I can to help you, so please leave me alone after this."

Finally, and man in baggy sweat pants and a bullet proof vest stepped out. His large reflective sunglasses made Tony feel intimidated. Tony noticed he had three guns strapped to his waist, along with a large switch-blade.

"Hello?" Tony said weakly.

"Son, I have three guns, and only one of them is a tranquilizer gun. I will choose which gun to use based on your actions," the man said smugly. "Understand?"

Tony took a step back and held his hands where the guy could see them.

"Don't act so rash Ralph," said someone on the other side of the van. "He's just a kid, and now you've probably scared him."

A man in a dark blue suit walked in front of Tony. He had the same dark black hair as the other guy, and the same sunglasses, but he took them off and smiled. "Don't worry Tony, we don't want to hurt you, we just want your cooperation." He placed his sunglasses in his shirt pocket and held up a large manila file.

"What do you guys want from me?" Tony asked in an assertive voice.

"Whoa whoa, hold your horses boy, we still have to do our introduction," said Ralph.

The other guy opened the folder and pretended to leaf through. He looked up and gave what Tony thought was a sinister grin. "We're from a Japanese research company," the man said. "I'm John, and he's Ralph, and our job is to clean up evidence of a small mishap that occurred a few months ago."

Tony stood still and waited for them to finish their speech.

"You're probably fully aware of what we're talking about, since you've been experiencing it yourself," said John. "Your healing ability is actually a bit fascinating, since most people's abilities only cause destruction."

"They must not know about the second part to my power," Tony thought.

"So what we need from you, is just a little cooperation, got it?" said Ralph. "Tell him what he needs to do."

"I was getting there Ralph. Anyways, you're probably thinking that we need you for research, that we're gonna cut you up and what not. That's not the case, the people back home have already gotten everything figured out," John said with a smile. "So you really have nothing to worry about."

"So what exactly do you want me to do?" Tony asked.

John opened up the file and handed a sheet of paper to him. "They know about you all the way in Japan, so there's really no turning back now," said John. "We really regret this since you might not even be that useful to us."

Tony looked at the paper and tried to read everything as quickly as he could. John stood there tapping his feet until he finally grabbed the paper from Tony.

"Maybe it'd be quicker if we just say this to you," said John. He tossed the file to the side and brought his attention back to Tony. "All people who were affected by this 'mishap' are in a sense, unstable. Whether it's emotionally unstable or physically." He walked over to the back of the van and opened it up. Inside was a girl strapped to a table with a cart of medical equipment next to her; it looked like the back of an ambulance.

"People aren't supposed to be able to do things like you can," said John. "This is what happens when things go wrong."

Tony averted his eyes from the girl struggling on the table. Tony could tell she had been forcefully taken in from the rips in her clothes.

"Your job," said John. "Is for you to go and heal her." He pushed Tony towards the van and watched over him.

"So I just need to heal her?" Tony asked softly.

John could tell that Tony was nervous. He took off his jacket and got in the van with Tony. "It's ok if you fail," said John. "This is just a test to see if you can do it. We're not expecting much."

Tony lifted his hand and then looked over at John. "What part of her am I supposed to heal?"

"How am I supposed to know? It's your power…" he said in an annoyed tone. It was clear that he was beginning to grow impatient.

"Well usually, I just touch the wound and then it goes away," Tony said meekly. "But I don't even know what's wrong with her."

John looked at his laptop and then sighed. "I suppose you should touch her head then, since there's something wrong with her brain."

Without hesitating, Tony put both of his hands on her head and focused on the girl.

"Is it working?" asked Tony. He looked down at the girl, and then green blotches on her skin had disappeared. Finally he lifted his hands and then walked over to John.

"You would think that it had worked," said John. "But she didn't stop degenerating, only the signs of degeneration have disappeared."

"So that means it didn't work then?" Tony asked for clarification.

"That's what I just said…"

Tony turned and headed back out the van, followed by John. Ralph was waiting for them outside, with his hand on his guns.

"Looks like you won't be useful to us after all."

"Does that means we can give him back the girl?" asked Ralph. He went to one of the side doors and opened it up.

"What girl are you talking about?" Tony asked in a stern voice. He clenched his fist in his jacket sleeve. His worst nightmare was coming back to him now.

"Well we had to have a back up plan," John said in a sarcastic tone. "Just incase you didn't cooperate with us."

"Who's in that van?" Tony asked again. He walked up to the door, but Ralph stood in his way.

"I can't let you do anything 'til I get the ok from that guy," Ralph said while pointing at John.

"Go ahead, we're done here anyways," said John.

Ralph stepped out of the way and smiled wickedly.

"She better be ok or else…" Tony struggled to say. He could feel himself getting angrier and angrier every second John stood in front of him.

"What will you do huh? Heal my paper cut?" said John. He let out a short laughter until it was interrupted by something.

"Don't… tempt him," said a familiar voice.

Tony rushed through and jumped into the van. "Sylvia, Sylvia!" he yelled. "Is that you," he said, still not believing she was there.

"Don't… worry Tony," said Sylvia. She sounded as though she was on her last breath. "I'm… not dead yet."

Sylvia smiled when she saw Tony's face, for once, he was crying for her. "You're eyes are wet," said Sylvia.

Tony pushed took Sylvia's hand and squeezed it, he pushed his other hand to his face and wiped away the tears.

"Hurry up and heal her," said a voice from behind him. John was standing there with a gun in his hand, twirling it around like it was a top. "Unless you want me to finish her off for you."

Tony looked down and examined his dying friend. He couldn't think clearly at the moment, all he knew was that she was hurt.

"Sylvia, I'll fix you up soon," Tony said gently. "And then you can yell at me and tell me what a bad friend I am."

"You're a good friend," Sylvia attempted to say. Her words came out all choked up, followed by an uncomfortable wheezing sound.

"This is it," Tony thought. "She's dying…" He wiped away the last of his tears and released Sylvia's hand.

"Should I heal her" was the last thought that went through Tony's head before Sylvia's eyes closed and her breathing stopped. Tony held his hands over Sylvia's chest and stomach, and waited for that familiar rush of energy.

"No," he thought. "She's not dead yet." Something within Tony told him that he was not too late.

"Just give up kid," said Ralph. "You wasted the rest of her life talking when you could've just saved her. What kind of idiot are you?"

Tony kept his head down, and his hand pressed against Sylvia's chest and stomach.

"I won't be as blunt as Ralph here, but you really do have to speed this up," said John. "We're busy adults, and a child like you shouldn't be holding us back much longer."

"I'm fighting death," Tony thought. He could feel the pushing and pulling between life and death as he struggled to heal her while she still had a spec of life in her.

"Five more minutes alright," said John.

Ralph got into the driver's seat and started the car. He turned on the radio and closed his eyes for a nap.

"Sylvia," Tony whispered. "I don't know if I just can't save you, or if you're choosing to die. But if it's the latter of the two I can't do it." He closed his eyes and thought of Sylvia slipping away from him. Then he remembered that day he was at the park with Anna, and the couple on the swing. If something cold and unfriendly comes though…

You don't let go.

"You hold on tighter," Tony mumbled. He could feel the pulling force loosen its grasp and a rush of energy flow up through his fingers.

Not soon after, Sylvia's heartbeat became lively again, and she began to breathe. Tony pulled her up and gave as big of a hug as he could.

"I knew you wouldn't die on me," he said softly into her ear. "Now let's go."

John smiled when he saw Tony carrying Sylvia out of the van, it was almost a great relief to him. "You must be happy that she made it Mr. Chatterbox," said John. "Maybe this will be a lesson for you to have your priorities straight from now on."

John joined his partner in the van and waved good bye to them as they drove away.

He carried Sylvia up to his room and placed her on his bed. She hadn't awoken yet, but Tony knew that she would come back.

"Good, they left," Tony said while looking out the window. He took one last glance to make sure they were gone for good, when he noticed a manila folder tossed against the fence near the garden.

Tony ran outside and picked up a thick file of papers. "Did they… leave this for me," said Tony, feeling all paranoid. He didn't dare look through it yet, he knew that nothing good would come from finding out more; at least for the moment it wasn't.

Tony threw the folder under a pile of clothes in his room and sat on the bed with Sylvia.

"I was wondering when you'd get back," said a weak and raspy voice. Sylvia sat up and coughed a few times before she spoke again. "Hello Tony, did you miss me?"

Tony laughed and hugged his friend once more. "When did you get up?"

Sylvia jumped off the bed and stretched. She fixed her hair and then sat on Tony's lap. "I woke up when you were gone, but I was glad you put me in your room."

"What's so special about my room?" Tony asked with a smile.

"I dunno, it's just more comfortable to wake up in a place you're familiar with," said Sylvia.

Tony sat still while trying to think of a good way to explain everything to Sylvia. "So yeah… about today," Tony said awkwardly. "I'm not really sure how to explain it to you."

Sylvia got off Tony and wrapped her arm around his neck, trying to pull him down. "It's ok Tony," she said while pulling with all her strength. "I won't ask any questions."

Tony sat with an awkward stare fore a few seconds until he thought of what to say. "Ok, two things," said Tony. "First of all, what the heck are you trying to do? Strangle me?"

Sylvia let go and placed her elbow on Tony's shoulder, leaning on his arm. "Possibly…"

"And secondly, how am I ever going to make this up to you?" Tony said while he placed his hand on her head.

"To make it up to me," said Sylvia. "You have to forgive me for all those mean things I said to you."

"What?" asked Tony, feeling confused. "But what you said about me, was all true."

"No don't say that!" Sylvia yelled. "You are not a useless friend at all, and I'm not just saying that because of what happened today.

"Sylvia, I am a horrible friend, and what happened today just confirmed it," said Tony.

"Not at all," said Sylvia. "Because this is the second time you saved me…" She pulled back her hair and pushed Tony onto his back. Without hesitating, she leaned over and Tony a warm kiss.

Tony blushed when the feeling of Sylvia's lips made him remember what she was referring to.

"Don't worry Tony, I wont tell anyone about what happened today," said Sylvia. She tried hard not to look too anxious to speak to him. "But that doesn't mean I won't be bothering you about it."  
Tony took that as his cue to get up and begin to search through the files that were left behind. The page on top was the one that Tony had previously seen, he put that aside and went to the next one.

"Whoa," Tony exclaimed. "Apparently they've captured and killed more than four-hundred people in the east-coast of North America."

"Let me see," said Sylvia. She grabbed the paper from him. "Don't you find it odd that none of these names appear in the news?"

"Those two guys said their job was cleaning up the evidence," said Tony. He put aside another stack of papers and came to a booklet filled with documents of people.

"Is that like a hit-list?" Sylvia asked, looking over Tony's shoulder.

"This is awkward," Tony thought. He could feel heat from Sylvia's body radiating onto his skin.

"Here, you can look at it," Tony said, throwing the book to Sylvia.

"Hey I think I know what this is," said Sylvia. She flipped to a page with Tony's name and picture on it. "It's where they log all the superhero profiles."

Sure enough, Tony's page was in the book. It had a surprisingly accurate profiling.

"Wow, they make everything sound so technical," said Sylvia. "What the hell does 'shared regenerative abilities' mean…"

"And apparently this guy can walk on air," she said while pointing at someone else.

Tony ignored her and continued looking through the files. The rest of the papers were all in Japanese, except for a bunch of reports stapled together at the end.

"Sylvia, does it say anything about someone named 'Amanda Tiu'?" asked Tony.

"Oh yeah, I passed it a few pages ago, this book is actually shorter than it looks. Only like fifty people must be in it…"

She opened up to a page with a smiling girl with a side ponytail.

"She does not look twenty-six years old," said Sylvia.

"Look at her number," said Tony. "It's zero."

"Does that mean she's the first one they discovered?" asked Sylvia.

"I think that's what all those reports mean," said Tony. "But they date back to last year."

"That's creepy," said Sylvia. She looked at the woman's smiling face one more time, and then skimmed over her profile again. "Tony, there's a note right here that says to go to the last page."

Tony flipped to the back, and saw a detailed log of locations and dates. "Are they tracking her or something?"

"They can't be the reason they were up here right?" asked Sylvia.

"That can't be right," said Tony. "Because this entry says that she died almost two months ago."

"This is unsettling," said Sylvia.

Tony dropped his head on his pillow and closed his eyes. "Sylvia, something else is also really unsettling."

Sylvia put her head down next to Tony's and answered his implied question. "What is it then?"

"How exactly did you end up in that van?" asked Tony.

Sylvia scratched her head and began her story.

I had just gotten home from school, I had to get a ride with someone else since you left me. And not soon after I got home they came to my house asking where you were. Of course I said that I wasn't going to tell them, since it was none of their business, so I tried to close the door on them. But they barged in and grabbed me, and that was when the short fat one shoved me in the van and then shot me in the chest. It really hurt, and he said something about the gun and bullets being specially made so that the victim would die slowly… I remember driving to your house, and they knocked on the door, but your sister was probably too scared to answer. That was good since they thought nobody was home. And then after that, they drove somewhere not that far and waited a little. That was probably around the time I lost consciousness.

Tony rubbed his eyes and yawned. "Do you remember if they said anything else?" he asked.

Sylvia was quiet for a few minutes until she finally remembered something. "They said that they were wasting their time here, and that they had something more important to do somewhere else," said Sylvia.

Tony turned his head and closed his eyes. "Did they say exactly what they needed to do?"

"No, not that I remember."

Tony opened his eyes and looked around his dark room. He felt the presence of his best friend lying down next to him, and he closed his eyes. "Wake me up when my parents get home ok?"

"Alright Tony," Sylvia replied while yawning.

_**Extra Part**_

_5 years ago…_

"You're so depressing, why don't you just die."

A group of teenage guys surrounded Sylvia and began pushing her around. She hugged her arms tightly around herself and closed her eyes, preparing to get hit.

"Look, she's giving up already," one of them said.

"Yeah she isn't so tough."

Sylvia fell to her knees and didn't look up. "You guys better back off or I'll fuck you up," yelled Sylvia.

"You couldn't take all of us," someone yelled.

"Shut up Tommy," said a tall, skinny Asian kid. He was their leader, Kevin Chin. His face was sinister and menacing, and he was probably the most insensitive guy in their grade.

"Now Sylvia, don't worry. We're not gonna hurt you," said Kevin. He offered his hand to help her up.

Without thinking Sylvia grabbed his hand and got swept onto her feet. Kevin violently pulled her to him, and locked his arms around her waist.

"I think we can all agree, that you're kinda cute," said Kevin. He was echoed by a loud "YEAH!" from his subordinates. "Alright, more like really hott," Kevin said sinisterly.

"What about it," Sylvia said confidently. She stared up and Kevin and gave a dark smile.

"A-and this whole goth thing you got goin' on, it's really kinky," said Kevin.

"YEAH!!" his friends yelled even louder than before.

"I think you know where this is going Sylvia?" Kevin gave her an evil smirk and moved his hand onto her butt.

Sylvia almost screamed in shock, but she bit her lip and held it in. "Is this all you got?" she said nervously.

"You're starting to feel it aren't you?" said Kevin. She could tell that Kevin was really enjoying the harassment. "I can tell from how red your face is, you like it."

"SLUT!" someone cried out.

"WHORE" someone else echoed.

"Now now," said Kevin. "Don't say those things about her… we know they aren't true."

Sylvia leaned her head close to Kevin's shoulder and slowly licked his neck. "Don't… tease your food," she said softly. This time her face was turning deep red from embarrassment. All that she was thinking was "I can't believe I said that, I can't believe I did that".

"Oh man, you are getting into it," Kevin exclaimed. "The other girls were too much of a pussy to act like this. They didn't show their true colors until the very end."

Sylvia pressed her ear against Kevin's chest and closed her eyes. She didn't want to see the eyes of all his friends weighing her down.

"I think it's about time you guys leave," Kevin said smugly.

"But it's about to get good though!" someone yelled.

"Hey shut up you retard, that's exactly why we have to leave."

Sylvia opened her eyes and meekly stretched up to Kevin's ear. "Are you… going to rape me?" she said quietly.

He watched as everyone single one of his minions left the class. The last one took a key from the table and waved good bye.

"Have fun boss, I'll look the door before I leave."

Kevin smiled when he heard the lock click up. He began by pulling off his jacket, revealing his long arms. He was about to speak when Sylvia beat him to it.

"You're such a cocky bastard," Sylvia said with a grin. "I was wondering when you'd make your slaves leave."

Kevin threw his jacket behind him and approached her. "You wanted to get on with the rest of it didn't you?"

Sylvia got to her feet and threw off her jacket as well. "You can say that, it'll be fairer now that it's one-on-one."

"I like the way you think babe." Kevin took off his shirt and began advancing towards her. "Damn your tits are huge…"

Sylvia took a deep breath as Kevin wrapped his bare arms around him. She could feel the heat of his body on her back through her thin t-shirt.

"I hope you know what you're doing," Sylvia yelled while elbowing him in the stomach. She pushed him away and regained her balance. "I can take you now that it's just us."

"You're a wild one aren't you?" Kevin said while catching his breath. "What if I told you I had my guys standing outside right now eh?"

Sylvia got into her fighting stance and cracked her neck. "You're not kind of guy though."

Sylvia charged at him and punched him in the chest, followed by kneeing him in the stomach. She then got behind him and pushed him to the ground.

"I hope you learned a lesson here today," Sylvia said with her foot on his back.

"Yeah I did," said Kevin. "Don't try to fuck fat chicks." Using his arms, he got up and pushed Sylvia back.

Before she could retort with a punch, Kevin grabbed both her wrists and pinned her against the wall.

"Let go of me," Sylvia yelled. "I don't want this…"

Kevin laughed and then wiped the sweat from his forehead. "Oh man, I'm already sweating and we haven't even started yet. You are a fun girl," said Kevin. "You don't really think that I wouldn't be able to overpower you do you?"

Sylvia turned her head away from his face.

"Or did you forget who you used to practice judo with when you were little."

Sylvia suddenly got really worried. "I can't believe I forgot about him," Julia thought.

"That's right," said Kevin. "I've got three more years of training than you… it's over."

Kevin freed one hand, and used his other hand to keep Sylvia's wrists against the wall. He forced her head to face him and moved in.

"First it starts with a kiss, and then we move on to the main dish…"

The door clicked open, and in came an Asian boy with huge glasses.

"Oh sorry," said Tony, immediately turning around. "I didn't know anyone was using this room. Mrs. Leverson asked me to put tomorrow's handouts on her desk," he said nervously.

Kevin turned around and sighed. "If you're done, you could hurry up and leave kid."

"No wait!" Sylvia yelled. Kevin quickly covered her mouth with his hand.

"What'd you say?" asked Tony. Tony looked over and examined what was going on, he almost fainted when he realized who it was.

"Sylvia? What're you doing with him?" asked Tony.

"We're in the middle of something that doesn't involve you," said Kevin. "So just leave already."

"Why do you guys always bully Sylvia?" Tony complained. "She didn't do anything wrong did she?"

"Please, leave me alone," Sylvia cried.

Kevin tightened his grip on Sylvia's wrist and grunted. "She's a little embarrassed cause you're here, so just leave already," he repeated.

Tony stood still, looking up at the clock, then the door. "Uhmm sure then."

"No please, Tony don't leave me," Sylvia yelled. Sylvia felt too embarrassed to say the rest.

"Oh right, I forgot that he's your boyfriend," Kevin said mockingly. "I'll give you a chance here, if you're her boyfriend then take her away." He released his grip on one of Sylvia's hands and let her run away from him.

"Tony!" Sylvia yelled, trying to escape Kevin's grasp.

"Uhmm… I'm not her boyfriend," said Tony, feeling embarrassed.

He looked at Sylvia and saw something he hadn't seen in a long time. She was crying. Tony knew what he had to do now.

"Sylvia…" he said. Tony turned around and walked towards the door.

"No wait Tony, please!" Sylvia watched as Tony walked away from her, she felt as though she was being abandoned for the first time.

Tony suddenly stopped and bent over, he picked up Sylvia's jacket and then reached out for her hand. "C'mon Sylvia let's get going. It's almost five, and you're mom's gonna be angry," Tony said with a warm smile.

Sylvia grabbed onto Tony's hand tightly, and felt her whole body jerk forward as Tony pulled her away from Kevin's grasps.

Kevin smiled with a slight look of defeat and bent down to pick up his shirt. "Have fun with her," he said before they left.

Out in the hallway, Tony hugged Sylvia tightly as she cried on him. He could feel Sylvia's back jump every time she took a breath between tears.

"It's ok," Tony would repeat over and over again. "I'm here, and I'm not going to hurt you, and I most definitely wont leave you… ever."

Tony finally let go and held Sylvia's hand as she began to calm down. She leaned against the lockers and closed her eyes.

"Tony…" she said.

"Yes Sylvia."

"That was actually kind of scary,"

"But Sylvia, you're never scared" said Tony. He took her other hand and held it tightly in his own. "You're not afraid of anything."

"That's not true," said Sylvia. "I almost died when I thought you were going to leave me there with Kevin… it wasn't pleasant at all."

"Well are you still scared right now?" asked Tony.

Sylvia nodded her head in a cute way while trying to hold back her tears.

"What if I do something to make you not scared?" asked Tony.

"What would that be?"

Tony pushed Sylvia's hands up against the locker and bent down a little until their faces were a few centimeters away from each other. He hesitated for a second until he heard her say "What are you waiting for".

He could actually feel her breath on his lip as Sylvia spoke, and he closed his eyes and pressed his lips up against hers.

This time, Sylvia did not feel frightened at all while being pushed up against the wall. Her whole body was rid of the fearful thoughts that made her upset, as the last of her tears rolled down her cheeks.

Tony could taste the saltiness of her tears as they dripped onto their lips and opened his eyes.

He finally pushed himself away from his friend and watched her as she caught her breath.

"I think that's what you do, if you really care about someone," said Tony.

He stared at Sylvia as she smiled back and brushed her fingers through his hair.

"So does this mean we're….?"

Sylvia hit him in the head before he could finish.

"Of course not," she said while hugging him. "It means we're friends, best best friends forever…"


End file.
